Harry Emerson Fosdick

Harry Emerson Fosdick (May 24, 1878 - October 5, 1969) was one of the most famous ministers of his time. Born in Buffalo, NY, he graduated from Colgate University and Union Seminary and was ordained in the Baptist church in 1903. He was widely acclaimed for his preaching and was hired as pastor by the First Presbyterian Church in NYC even though he was a Baptist.

At First Presbyterian his preaching drew crowds to the church-- sometimes there was a two-hour line to get in. However, in 1923 a sermon titled Shall the Fundamentalists Win? was not well-received by the Presbyterian hierarchy and Fosdick resigned in 1924 to avoid formal censure at a church trial. He was immediately hired by the Park Avenue Baptist Church largely due to the influence of philanthopist John D. Rockefeller Jr., who envisioned an important future for that church. Funded by Rockefeller millions, the Park Avenue Baptist Church under Fosdick's leadership became the interdenominational Riverside Church, moving into a vast new building (pictured below) overlooking the Hudson River in 1930.

Today's hymn was written by Fosdick for the dedication service of Riverside Church and has become one of the most widely-known and loved hymns of the twentieth century. I randomly pulled out six or seven hymnals of the last twenty years from varying denominations and every one included this hymn. Its message of social justice is as timely today as when it was written.

God of grace and God of glory,
On thy people pour thy power.
Crown thine ancient church’s story,
Bring its bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.

Lo! the hosts of evil ’round us,
Scorn thy Christ, assail thy ways.
From the fears that long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.

Cure thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss the Savior’s goal,
Lest we miss the Savior’s goal.

Set our feet on lofty places,
Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set us free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not earth nor thee,
That we fail not earth nor thee.

Save us from weak resignation,
To the evils we deplore.
Let the search for thy salvation,
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Serving thee whom we adore,
Serving thee whom we adore.

Harry Emerson Fosdick, 1930; alt.
Tune: CWM RHONDDA (8.7.8.7.8.7.)
John Hughes, 1907

This hymn was first sung to the tune REGENT SQUARE by Henry Smart, but John Hughes's CWM RHONDDA (previously seen and heard on the blog) has become the accepted tune, used perhaps as early as the Methodist Hymnal of 1935. Though Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote three other hymns they are all but unknown today. His autobiography took its title from this text: The Living of These Days (1956).

Fosdick remained at Riverside Church until retiring in 1946. His radio program, The National Vesper Hour was heard across the country for nineteen years. He published more than forty books and sermon collections and several are still in print today. Though conflict over a sermon had driven him from the First Presbyterian Church, today on their website they honor his preaching ministry.

He did become more conservative in later years, believing that the Great Depression, the totalitarian regimes of Hitler and Stalin, and World War II raised questions about the essential goodness of humanity, and that modernism could "water down" the reality of God. "What Christ does to modern culture is to challenge it," he wrote, though this was not really in opposition to the words of his famous hymn: Save us from weak resignation to the evils we deplore.

One Year Ago: Emily Divine Wilson

Freely May We Learn to Give

Jesus Christ, eternal Savior,

Source of life and truth and grace,

Word made flesh, whose birth incarnate

Hallows all our human race,

Thou, our head who, throned in glory,

For thine own dost ever plead,

Fill us with thy love and pity;

Heal our wrongs, and help our need.

Bind us all as one together

In thy church’s sacred fold,

Weak and healthy, poor and wealthy,

Sad and joyful, young and old.

Is there want, or pain, or sorrow?

Make us all the burden share.

Are there spirits crushed and broken?

Teach us how to soothe their care.

Jesus, thou hast lived for others,

So may we for others live;

Freely have thy gifts been granted,

Freely may we learn to give.

Thine the gold and thine the silver,

Thine the wealth of land and sea,

We but stewards of thy bounty,

Held in solemn trust for thee.

Come, O Christ, and reign among us,

Fount of love and strength and peace,

Hush the storm of strife and passion,

Bid its cruel discords cease:

Thou who hopest, thou who willest,

That thy people should be one,

Grant, O grant our prayer’s fruition:

Here on earth thy will be done.

Somerset Lowry, 1893; alt.

Tune: TON-Y-BOTEL (8.7.8.7.D.)

Thomas J. Williams, 1890

It's generally agreed that the first thirty years or so of the twentieth century was the first great flowering of hymns in support of social justice and our obligation to the world around us, from the hymns of Frank Mason North, Walter Russell Bowie, and John Haynes Holmes to Harry Emerson Fosdick's God of grace and God of glory. Here's one that was written a bit earlier, in England, that those men may have known, though I don't think it's as well known today as their later hymns.

In order to make a hymn like this spread to a wider audience it needs a strong, somewhat familiar tune that people will remember and want to sing again. I like picking my own tunes for less-familiar texts so I usually don't look at what's been used before. I went first to this page (for the 8.7.8.7.D. meter) and listened to several of the 143 possible tunes there (which have sound files so that you can hear them too -- I have lists of many more that I don't use because you can't hear them). I finally chose this one for its muscular drive and was pleased and surprised to find that it's one of the tunes already used at the Cyber Hymnal. Even stranger, my second-choice tune (WEISSE FLAGGEN) was one of theirs as well. Odd.

TON-Y-BOTEL is a tune by Welsh composer/organist Thomas Williams. The tune comes from an anthem he had written, Light in the Valley (the great Welsh title is Gloeu yn y Glyn), adapted into a hymn tune a few years later. There was a legend, since proven false, that the tune was found on a beach washed ashore in a bottle, which is where its name comes from ("tune in a bottle"). Hymns for the Celebration of Life, the Unitarian hymnal of 1964, claims that the tale was "improvised by a fun-loving youth at a party," which suggests that there's more to the story. Who was at that party that then put that tune name into a hymnal? Nowadays they call the tune EBENEZER, but here on the blog I'm sticking to the "discredited" earlier name. At least it's a Welsh name, unlike EBENEZER. Plus, it's a good story, like Purcell and the chocolate poisoning.