Christians are on a journey through life, and our destination is heaven, where we will forever be with the Lord. But this is not an easy journey. It is one that demands perseverance and determination, as well as the struggle against temptations and distractions. Of course, none of us are able to do this on our own. We need the Savior who has promised to lead us all the way home. “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with Mine eye” (Psalm 32.8). There are many spiritual obstacles on the way, but Jesus has promised to lead us “all the way.”
One of the beloved hymns of Fanny Crosby says exactly that: “All the Way My Savior Leads Me.” Frances Jane Crosby (1820-1915) is remembered as “the Queen of Gospel Hymnody” for the ten thousand gospel songs she composed, almost all of them during the last half of her 95 years! When Fanny was about six weeks old, her parents realized with alarm that something was wrong with her eyes. The local doctor was away, but the Crosbys found a man, no one afterward recalled his name, who claimed to be a physician. He put a hot poultice on the baby’s inflamed eyes, insisting it would draw out the infection. The infection did clear up, but white scars appeared and in the months that followed the baby registered no response to objects held before her. As it turned out, Fanny was not totally blind, but her eyes were severely damaged. Even in old age she could discern day and night. But any clarity of vision was gone.
When Fanny Crosby wrote “All the Way My Savior Leads Me” in 1875, she was expressing her own testimony of God’s guidance. Even her blindness, she realized, was part of His plan. Years later, Fanny viewed her blindness as a special gift from God, believing He had given her a particular “soul-vision” which equipped her for a special work. She not only developed a phenomenal capacity for memorization (including the entire contents of many books of the Bible!), she also “saw” many things with her mind that others could not see with their eyes. In her latter years, she wrote in her little autobiography, “It was the best thing that could have happened to me …. How in the world could I have lived such a helpful life had I not been blind?” “Don’t blame the doctor,” Fanny said on another occasion, “He is probably dead by this time. But if I could meet him, I would tell him that he unwittingly did me the greatest favor in the world.”
Although she did not begin writing hymns in earnest until she was in her mid-40s, she wrote her first poem at the age of eight, which described her blindness. She later was quoted as saying, “It seemed intended by the blessed providence of God that I should be blind all my life, and I thank Him for the dispensation. If perfect earthly sight were offered me tomorrow, I would not accept it. I might not have sung hymns to the praise of God if I had been distracted by the beautiful and interesting things about me, and when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior.”
Crosby’s literary work was quite extensive. It was published in numerous publications, including “The Saturday Evening Post” and praised highly by President John Quincy Adams among others. She was personally acquainted with several US Presidents during her lengthy life. She also wrote the librettos for three cantatas and a popular operetta,“The Flower Queen; The Coronation of the Rose,” and she wrote patriotic songs during the Civil War. She married Alexander van Alstyne Jr. in 1858. They had one daughter, who died soon after her birth. Crosby’s hymn, “Safe in the Arms of Jesus” was inspired by her death. She is best remembered for such hymns as “Blessed Assurance,” “To God Be the Glory,” “Praise Him! Praise Him!,” “Tell Me the Story of Jesus,” “Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross,” “I Am Thine, O Lord,” and “Redeemed, How I Love to Proclaim It.”
This is how Fanny described her working method: “It may seem a little old-fashioned, always to begin one’s work with prayer, but I never undertake a hymn without first asking the good Lord to be my inspiration.” She often composed six or seven hymns a day and sometimes twelve of them at a time. Of course, since she was blind, she could not see a manuscript. So her composing work was done in her mind, and she could review and make corrections to the texts by “reading” and “editing” them in her mind. Her hymns were never written for financial gain. The royalties were donated to worthy causes. She was a moving force in the establishment of schools for the blind. She literally gave her life away and often ended up penniless. She passed away February 12, 1915.
She often struggled financially. Of one occasion, with no money to pay her rent, she began to pray. She later wrote, “Not long after I had prayed for the money, a gentleman came into the house, passed the time of day, shook hands with me, and went out immediately. When I closed my hand, after the friendly salutation, I found in it a bill which he left there. A visitor later told me it was a five dollar bill. I have no way to account for this, except to believe that God, in answer to my prayer, put it into the heart of this good man to bring me the money. My first thought was, in what a wonderful way the Lord helps me! All the way my Savior leads me! I immediately wrote the hymn, and Dr. Robert Lowry, the famous preacher and hymn writer, set it to music.”
Robert Lowry succeeded William B. Bradbury as the music editor for the Biglow and Main Co., and produced such well known songs as “Christ Arose” and “Shall We Gather at the River.” He composed the tune for “All the Way” and published the song in his Sunday school song collection, “Brightest and Best,” which he compiled in 1875 in cooperation with William Howard Doane. Among hymnbooks published during the twentieth century, this gospel song appears in almost every one, certainly hundreds of them.
In stanza 1, Crosby sings about how Jesus guides us. As in Psalm 23:6, He is the shepherd whose tender mercy makes sure that our needs are met. And these are not just the physical needs, but even more so the spiritual needs. He guides us to receive heavenly peace and divine comfort, as in Philippians 4:6-7. Therefore, we can be assured that whatever befalls us, the Lord will do all things for our good (Romans 8:28).
All the way my Savior leads me – What have I to ask beside?
Can I doubt His faithful mercy Who through life has been my guide ?
Heavenly peace, divinest comfort, Here by faith in Him to dwell!
For I know, whate’er fall me, Jesus doeth all things well.
In stanza 2, Crosby sings about how Jesus feeds us. In John 6:32-35, He tells us that He is the living bread of life, with which He sustains us. In addition, when it comes to thirst, when our soul is in a dry and weary land, He will refresh us, as we read in Psalm 63:1. Like the Israelites of old, we can look to the Lord for “a spring of joy” gushing from the rock before us. Crosby would have had these scriptures in mind: Exodus 17:6, John 4:10-14, and 1 Corinthians 10:4.
All the way my Savior leads me – Cheers each winding path I tread,
Gives me grace for every trial, Feeds me with the living bread.
Though my weary steps may falterAnd my soul a-thirst may be,
Gushing from the rock before me, Lo! A spring of joy I see.
In stanza 3, Crosby sings about how Jesus gives us rest out of “the fullness of His love.” In John 14:1-3, Jesus promises wonderful rest in His Father’s house. And she goes on to look ahead to that day when Jesus returns that our spirits will be clothed in immortality, and our soul “wings its flight to realms of day” (2 Corinthians 5:1-6). And so she concludes, “This my song through endless ages: Jesus led me all the way,” just as He did with ancient Israel (Deuteronomy 32:12).
All the way my Savior leads me – Oh, the fullness of His love!
Perfect rest to me is promisedIn my Father’s house above.
When my spirit, clothed immortal, Wings its flight to realms of day,
This my song through endless ages: Jesus led me all the way.
This song is somewhat unusual among the more popular of Fanny Crosby’s works in that unlike most others, it does not have the standard chorus which follows each stanza. While it is not a song of praise addressed directly to the Lord, it is more of a devotional hymn praising His goodness and guidance than the typical gospel song. If I am to have the hope of going to be with God, I must strive to live here on earth so that “All the Way My Savior Leads Me.”
The music for her gospel song was written by Robert Lowry (1826 –1899), an American preacher who became a popular writer of gospel music in the mid- to late-19th century. Born in Philadelphia, Lowry studied at the University at Lewisburg, Pennsylvania and entered the Baptist ministry in 1854. During the following 45 years he held a number of pastorates in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Between 1869 and 1875 he combined his pastoral work with a professorship in rhetoric at his alma mater, and later served as the University’s chancellor. From 1868 he acted as hymnal editor to Biglow and Main, the country’s leading publisher of gospel and Sunday School music. Under his supervision more than 20 hymnals were produced by the firm, many of wide and enduring popularity.
Despite his protestations that preaching was his main vocation and that music was merely a sideline, it is as a hymnwriter that Lowry is chiefly remembered, ranking with such as W. H. Doane and Ira D. Sankey as one of the originators of a musical tradition that has lasted until the modern era of revival. His best-known hymns include “Shall We Gather at the River,” “Christ Arose,” and “Nothing But the Blood of Jesus.”
His fondness for music was exhibited in his earliest years. As a child he amused himself with the various musical instruments that came into his hands. At the age of seventeen, having experienced a powerful commitment of his heart to the Lord, he joined the First Baptist Church of Philadelphia, where he not only sang in the choir but also began teaching Sunday School. Lowry was known as a man of rare administrative ability, a most excellent preacher, a thorough Bible student, and whether in the pulpit or upon the platform, always a brilliant and interesting speaker. He was of a genial and pleasing disposition, and a high sense of humor was one of his most striking characteristics. Very few men had greater ability in painting pictures from the imagination. He could thrill an audience with his vivid descriptions, inspiring others with the same thoughts that inspired him.
When he saw that the obligations of musical editorship were laid upon him, he began the study of music in earnest, and sought the best musical text-books and works on the highest forms of musical composition. He possessed one of the finest musical libraries in the country. It abounded in works on the philosophy and science of musical sounds. He also had some musical works in his possession that were over one hundred and fifty years old.
A reporter once asked him what was his method of composition. “Do you write the words to fit the music, or the music to fit the words?” His reply was, “I have no method. Sometimes the music comes and the words follow, fitted insensibly to the melody. I watch my moods, and when anything good strikes me, whether words or music, and no matter where I am, at home or on the street, I jot it down. Often the margin of a newspaper or the back of an envelope serves as a notebook. My brain is a sort of spinning machine, I think, for there is music running through it all the time. I do not pick out my music on the keys of an instrument. The tunes of nearly all the hymns I have written have been completed on paper before I tried them on the organ. Frequently the words of the hymn and the music have been written at the same time.”
Lowry said, “I would rather preach a gospel sermon to an appreciative, receptive congregation than write a hymn,” yet in spite of his preferences, his hymns have gone on and on, translated into many languages, preaching and comforting thousands upon thousands of souls, furnishing them expression for their deepest feelings of praise and gratitude to God for His goodness to the children of men. What he had thought in his inmost soul has become a part of the emotions of the whole Christian world. We are all his debtors.
Here is a link to the singing of the hymn at Philadelphia’s Tenth Presbyterian Church at the funeral of pianist Sam Hsu.