{"id":3694,"date":"2024-05-28T07:30:42","date_gmt":"2024-05-28T11:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=3694"},"modified":"2024-05-28T07:31:36","modified_gmt":"2024-05-28T11:31:36","slug":"gods-strange-gift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/28\/gods-strange-gift\/","title":{"rendered":"God’s Strange Gift"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, <\/em>click here<\/a>

Frances Jane Crosby, who was born in New York in 1820, developed a minor eye inflammation when she was six weeks old. 

Although there have been differing accounts of a local doctor\u2019s efforts to address her condition, they all agree on one thing: He did not make things better. 

The little girl lost her sight in both eyes. The doctor never forgave himself. He moved away in a state of despair.

Looking back later in life, Frances, who became known as Fanny, held no ill will toward him. \u201cIf I could meet him now I would say \u2018Thank you, thank you,\u2019 over and over again, for making me blind.\u201d

That extraordinary perspective was born not of self-loathing, but of a keen sense that God had used her sightlessness to accomplish extraordinary things. Undistracted by a world full of potential diversions, she gave herself fully to the task of writing lyrics to songs and hymns.

Her very first poem, written at age eight, reveals that she embraced that idea early on:

Oh, what a happy child I am, although I cannot see;<\/em>
I am resolved that in this world, contented I will be<\/em>
How many blessings I enjoy that other people don\u2019t,<\/em>
So weep or sigh because I\u2019m blind, I cannot or I won\u2019t<\/em>

It was clear that Fanny Crosby was a gifted child. After the death of her father, she was left in the care of her mother, grandmother, and a special neighbor named Mrs. Hawley \u2013 all of whom liked to read. Fanny liked to listen.

She had a prodigious memory. At the age of 10, she set out to memorize five Bible chapters a week. By the time she was 15, she had committed to memory the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible), all four Gospels, the book of Proverbs, and many of the Psalms.

Her real love, however, was writing. She could compose as many as 40 poems or song lyrics at a time, seeming to keep them in separate \u201cfiling cabinets\u201d in her mind until she could dictate them to a friend or associate. 

In 1835 she became a student at the Institution for the Blind in New York City. She excelled at everything except math. \u201cI loathe, abhor, it makes me sick, to hear the word \u2018arithmetic.\u2019\u201d She became the school\u2019s unofficial resident poet, and later married a blind fellow student. 

Crosby wrote and published more than 1,000 secular poems, a few of which became popular songs. But her true calling emerged when she experienced a spiritual awakening at the age of 30. 

Over the rest of her long life \u2013 she died in 1915 just short of her 95th<\/sup> birthday \u2013 she crafted more than 8,000 gospel songs and hymns. Historians describe her as the \u201cmother of modern congregational singing in America.\u201d 

Most people who have attended a traditional church service at some point during the past century are familiar with Blessed Assurance, Pass Me Not O Gentle Savior<\/em>, and Jesus is Tenderly Calling You Home<\/em>.

Nineteenth-century hymnbook publishers sometimes expressed concern about including so many songs by a single author in a single volume \u2013 and a female author at that. Fanny addressed their uneasiness by using more than 200 pseudonyms \u2013 a common practice at the time. But it wasn\u2019t hard to discern her touch.

\u201cIt seemed intended by the blessed providence of God that I should be blind all my life,\u201d she once wrote. Her blindness, she believed, was a gift \u2013 God\u2019s strange gift.

It\u2019s hard to miss the fact that her lyrics often include references to seeing. Once day her eyes would be fully open, in every sense of the word.

Crosby\u2019s hymn To God Be the Glory<\/em> became a sensation some 40 years after her death when it became associated with Billy Graham\u2019s evangelistic crusades. Here are some of the words:

To God be the glory, great things He hath done;<\/em>
So loved He the world that He gave us His Son,
Who yielded His life an atonement for sin,
And opened the life gate that all may go in.<\/em>

(refrain)
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,<\/em>
Let the earth hear His voice!<\/em>
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,<\/em>
Let the people rejoice!<\/em>
O come to the Father, through Jesus the Son,<\/em>
And give Him the glory, great things He hath done.<\/em>

Great things He hath taught us, great things He hath done,<\/em>
And great our rejoicing through Jesus the Son;
But purer, and higher, and greater will be
Our wonder, our transport, when Jesus we see.<\/em>

Notice again that last line: \u201cour wonder, our transport [that is, our deep sense of joy] when Jesus we see.\u201d

Seeing Jesus in the next world is one of the New Testament\u2019s most compelling promises. John writes, \u201cWe are God\u2019s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is\u201d (I John 3:2).

One day our trust in an invisible Savior will be transformed into an encounter with the visible Lord \u2013 an experience that will be unlike anything we have known in this world.

In the meantime, all of us are walking the same path as Fanny Crosby. That\u2019s not to say that any of us could possibly pursue her same calling.

But we do have God\u2019s strange and unexpected gifts \u2013 frailties, failures, weaknesses, and disappointments that, from one perspective, seem to have ruined our lives.

We can shake our fists at God or those who have \u201cdone us wrong.\u201d We can sink into bitterness. We can cynically conclude that the whole God-loves-me story is a fairy tale for gullible children.

Or we can decide that, like Fanny Crosby, God\u2019s deepest call to us will actually emerge in the circumstances that seem most calculated to steal our joy.

As she wrote, \u201cAnd I shall see Him face to face, and tell the story of His grace.\u201d

We will all have stories to tell as well \u2013 and just like hers, they will also set heaven singing. 
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Frances Jane Crosby, who was born in New York in 1820, developed a minor eye inflammation when she was six weeks old.  Although there have been differing accounts of a local doctor\u2019s efforts to address her condition, they all agree on one thing: He did not make things better.  The little… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3695,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[252,635,744,112],"class_list":["post-3694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-contentment","tag-gods-call","tag-hymns","tag-suffering"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3694"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3697,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3694\/revisions\/3697"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}