It has been suggested that more people have heard Billy Graham in person than any other single individual in history. That number is probably in excess of 215 million people. One television broadcast alone in 1966 may have reached an audience of 2.5 billion people worldwide! Since every evangelistic meeting of the Billy Graham crusades concluded with the hymn “Just As I Am” as an invitation for people to respond to the gospel of Jesus Christ, one would be justified in claiming that more people have heard “Just As I Am” than any other hymn in history!
And yet this widely known evangelistic “invitation hymn” was not written for that purpose. It is one of the hymns composed by Charlotte Elliott of Brighton, England (1789-1871) and included in her 1836 collection of hymns, The Invalid’s Hymn Book. That collection included 115 of her hymns. It is an eloquent testimony of her life of patient endurance in suffering, not only physical but also emotional and spiritual. It was an expression of her confidence in Christ when she realized that she could come to Him and be useful, “Just As I Am,” even from her bed as an invalid.
As a young lady she had enjoyed a carefree life, and was becoming popular as a portrait artist and author of humorous poetry. Her family were evangelical Anglicans. But by the time she was thirty, her health had deteriorated, leaving her confined to bed or wheelchair for the rest of her life. Not surprisingly, this left her very despondent and in constant, debilitating pain. In 1822 when she was 33 years old an evangelist and hymnologist from Switzerland, Dr. César Malan, visited the Elliott home. Her found her not only depressed but also filled with rage over her condition and feeling totally useless, even in God’s sight.
Her pious family was teeming with ministers who offered their counsel. Her grandfather was Rev. Henry Venn, a famous evangelical preacher. Other men in the family had followed suit. When she asked them what she could do to improve her character, they told her to pray, ask forgiveness,and try harder – not very good advice.
Malan told her “You must come just as you are — a sinner, to the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.” The Lord used Malan’s counsel to touch her heart and revolutionize her attitude toward her condition. From the time of this visit, for the rest of her life, she always celebrated the day of her visit with Dr. Malan as her spiritual birthday. She wrote “God alone knows what it is, day after day, hour after hour, to fight against bodily feelings of almost overpowering weakness and exhaustion, to resolve not to yield to slothfulness, depression and instability.” She also wrote “God sees, God guides, and God guards me. His voice bids me to be happy and holy in His service just where I am.”
She evidently never forgot the words of her Swiss friend, as they are the basis of the most popular song that she wrote, even though she did not write the poem “Just As I Am” until 1836, 14 years after Dr. Malan’s visit. It was published that year in the second edition of The Invalid’s Hymn Book. She gave it the title “Him that Cometh to Me I Will in No Wise Cast Out” (John 6:37). She wrote “Just As I Am” hoping that the proceeds from it would aid financially in building a school for the children of poor preachers, which her own preacher brother was trying to build there in Brighton. As it was, this one song brought in more money than all the bazaars and other fundraising events that her brother held for the school.
The hymn is one of those few for which we know not only the author’s story, but also the exact circumstances in which it was written. Here is the account given in 1897 by her nephew, Rev. G. Handley C. G. Moule. He was the evangelical Anglican Bishop of Durham from 1901 to 1920 and was a New Testament scholar who wrote over 60 books, a number of them dealing with the Pauline epistles.
But ill health still beset her . . . it often caused her the peculiar pain of a seeming uselessness in her life while the circle around her was full of unresting service-ableness for God. Such a time of trial marked the year 1834, when she was forty-five years old, and living in Westfield Lodge, Brighton s. . . .
Her brother, the Rev. H. V. Elliott, had not long before conceived the plan of St. Mary’s Hall, at Brighton — a school designed to give, at nominal cost, a high education to the daughters of clergymen. . . . In aid of St. Mary’s Hall there was to be held a bazaar . . . Westfield Lodge was all astir; every member of the large circle was occupied morning and night in the preparations, with the one exception of the ailing sister Charlotte — as full of eager interest as any of them, but physically fit for nothing.
The night before the bazaar she was kept wakeful by distressing thoughts of her apparent uselessness; and these thoughts passed — by a transition easy to imagine — into a spiritual conflict, till she questioned the reality of her whole spiritual life, and wondered whether it were anything better than an illusion of the emotions, an illusion ready to be sorrowfully dissolved.
The next day, the busy day of the bazaar, she lay upon her sofa. . . . The troubles of the night came back upon her with such force that she felt they must be met and conquered in the grace of God. She gathered up in her soul the great certainties, not of her emotions, but of her salvation: her Lord, his power, his promise. And taking pen and paper from the table she deliberately set down in writing, for her own comfort, ‘the formula of her faith.’
Hers was a heart which always tended to express its depths in verse. So in verse she restated to herself the gospel of pardon, peace, and heaven. (Quoted from Louis Benson, Studies of Familiar Hymns, Second Series, 201-202)
Within a matter of years Ms. Elliott had the hymn published in The Invalid’s Hymn Book, and from there it spread and gained in popularity.
She wrote more than 150 hymns, some anonymously. They are simple, devotional and full of consolation for those in sickness and sorrow, and are contained in six volumes: Psalms and Hymns for Public, Private, and Social Worship (1835-1848); The Christian Remembrance Pocket-Book; The Invalid’s Hymn Book; Hours of Sorrow Cheered and Comforted; or, Thoughts in Verse (1836); Morning and Evening Hymns for a Week (1839); and Thoughts in Verse on Sacred Subjects (1869).
When analyzing the text, we must remember that while she wrote this about her physical affliction, every stanza applies to every person who realizes how sin has afflicted them, and how every one of us can come to Jesus just as we are to find spiritual healing and the strength to persevere in whatever physical difficulties continue to challenge us.
Stanza 1 points us to Jesus’ invitation, “Come unto Me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” This identifies the all-important fact that we come not on the basis of anything we are or have done, but only that “Thy blood was shed for me.”
Just as I am – without one plea, But that Thy blood was shed for me,
And that Thou bidst me come to Thee, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 2 encourages us to come to Jesus right now, not waiting until we have made ourselves more presentable, which we cannot do. We can’t cleanse our soul of the “dark blot” of sin, but it is only Jesus “whose blood can cleanse each spot.”
Just as I am – and waiting not To rid my soul of one dark blot,
To Thee, whose blood can cleanse each spot, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 3 recognizes that we may have significant doubts, fightings, and fears that Satan would use to keep us at arms’ length from the gospel. But we can bring those, whether physical or emotional or intellectual or spiritual, and Jesus will welcome us and deal with them.
Just as I am – though toss’d about With many a conflict, many a doubt,
Fightings and fears within, without, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 4 described dimensions of Charlotte Elliott’s condition (though not exactly) and are the conditions present in all of us to one degree or another. In our unregenerate condition we are spiritually “poor, wretched, and blind.” In Christ we find “sight, riches, and healing” of the soul.
Just as I am – poor, wretched, blind; Sight, riches, healing of the mind,
Yea, all I need, in Thee to find, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 5 rings in our ears from having sung these words at a Billy Graham crusade, as we saw hundreds respond to a Savior who promised that He will “welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve.” He has promised this, and when we simply believe His promise, these are granted by grace.
Just as I am – Thou wilt receive, Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;
Because Thy promise I believe, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 6 assures us that Jesus’ saving love at Calvary has fully paid for all our sins, and has therefore broken down every barrier that once separated us from God. The result is that now we belong to Him; we are “Thine alone.”
Just as I am – Thy love unknown Has broken every barrier down;
Now to be Thine, yea, Thine alone, – O Lamb of God, I come!
Stanza 7 is not often included in hymnals today, but is a wonderful conclusion to the hymn. Just as we were, we came to Christ. Now that we are in Him, it is true that in the present tense, “Just as I am,” His free love is ours not just “for a season” but also “then above” forever. Recalling the words of Ephesians 3:18, the hymn points us to “the breadth, depth, and height” of His love for us that has been proven over and over again.
Just as I am – of that free love The breadth, length, depth, and height to prove,
Here for a season, then above, – O Lamb of God, I come!
And we mustn’t fail to notice how every stanza ends with the words, “O Lamb of God, I come.” Once again, recall Jesus’ invitation in Matthew 11:28, “Come unto Me.” We shouldn’t think only of those who literally “came” by coming forward physically in response to an evangelistic invitation in a meeting, but to every soul that has come to Jesus, whether in church or in the privacy of their home, by a public profession of faith or a silent inward trusting heart, while reading a piece of Christian literature or responding to a friend’s loving words.
The hymn is most commonly sung to the tune WOODWORTH, written by William Bradbury (1816-1868). He and his family moved from York, Maine to Boston. He attended singing classes with Lowell Mason, who himself has given us many widely used hymn tunes. Bradbury was a church organist by the age of 15. He traveled to Europe to learn from musicians there. In 1851 he returned to the US and began to manufacture Bradbury pianos. He edited 59 books of sacred and secular music, much of which he wrote himself. He attended the Presbyterian Church in Bloomfield, NJ for many years before dying from tuberculosis. Bradbury wrote the music for many well-known hymns, including “Just As I Am,” “’Tis Midnight, and on Olives’ Brow,” “My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less,” Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead us,” “He Leadeth Me,” and “Sweet Hour of Prayer.” WOODWORTH was first published with another hymn text in an 1849 Psalm collection. It was years later when Thomas Hastings adapted it for use with “Just As I Am.” This is the music everyone thinks of from the use of the hymn in the Billy Graham crusades.
Here is a link to the conclusion of Billy Graham’s sermon at a crusade in Texas. As he always did, at the end of his sermon, he invited people to come forward to come to Christ. As they came, the choir sang the hymn “Just As I Am.” Watching and listening to this will bring back powerful memories for those who were among those who responded at one of those crusades.