We Have Heard the Joyful Sound, Jesus Saves -- Priscilla J. Owens

This school teacher was thinking as a missionary. So if one ever pondered what the fusion of those two vocations would sound like, Priscilla Jane Owens left no mystery outstanding for this question when she crafted “Jesus Saves” in 1882 while living in Baltimore (see period map from 1852 here). As she sat down in the Union Square Methodist Church, she wanted this to be a joyful sound, and indeed she put those very words in the first syllables of the poetry she wrote. Missionary work is to be exciting, was her bottom line. How did she stamp this idea on the song? Two words that she exclaimed repeatedly are the recipe she prescribed.

Perhaps Priscilla learned her method in “Jesus Saves” as a result of her lengthy career in children’s education. If you want those you’re cultivating to remember an idea, it’s best to repeat it, perhaps many times in a small space. That way, they cannot possibly miss it. This 53-year old teacher had seen her share of students for many years on both Sundays and the other days of the week, and she must have shared many songs with them by this time in 1882. Jesus Saves! That was the message she wanted these students, probably both children and adults for this occasion, to grasp. The church apparently was anticipating a worship service that would focus on mission work. Where the mission work was going isn’t explicitly communicated, but perhaps it was a variety of places, given what she said in the song’s verses. ‘All around’ and ‘every land’ (v. 1), ‘far and wide’ (v.2), Priscilla says. He works, no matter where one goes -- a confidence and buoyancy she and the Union Square church members evidently wanted to accompany whomever and wherever their church-supported missionary was. Verse three implies they expected there would be challenges for the mission work, ‘battle strife’ and ‘gloom’ which the messenger would encounter and overcome with the same two words. Perhaps these people, including Priscilla, were not strangers to difficulties. ‘We don’t wear rose-colored glasses, but here’s our solution’, they say. Fix your sight on the completed work of Him – that fact is crucial for everyone. Anyone who’s bought into Jesus’ accomplishment – really staked his life on it – will be the most effective missionary.     

What more needs to be said? Priscilla Owens had a mission, to create as much a mood as anything else. We should be energized about our leader, and the future He provides. But would it be easier for hearers to grasp what she’s saying, maybe if they had once been destitute? Possess nothing, but then discover the gold bullion that makes you a king. Priscilla marks this gold with something like an X on the treasure map. Question:What do I in fact have, besides what He’s got waiting for me? Answer: Nothing. Next question: How does one find the pot of gold? Priscilla might say her two words are your answer to that one.  

See more information on the song story in these sources: The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006; and Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1990.

See 4 verses of song and brief biography here of composer: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/o/w/e/owens_pj.htm

See this link for exact location of the church where the composer developed the hymn: http://churches-and-cemeteries.com/pages/1709659.html

Freely, Freely -- Carol Owens

Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give. (Matthew 10:8)

She and her husband had a charge, not from just one man but from two. ‘Tell others what you think is most important about the church’, Carol Owens heard one man say. And so, the genesis of what she and her husband Jimmy would include in a production began. At some point soon thereafter Carol investigated the roots of their beliefs and decided that ‘Freely, Freely” was a very key concept they should communicate to observers of the musical they would be presenting. It would be a crowd of not just observers, but seekers whom they wanted to introduce to the second man Carol had heard as she and Jimmy set about constructing the message to convey.

Carol and Jimmy Owens had bought into the Jesus movement in the countercultural environment of the late 1960s and early 1970s and made it their mission to introduce others to the Jesus they knew. So in 1972, 41-year old Carol and her husband must have found it pretty self-evident on whom they should focus a musical production that a church leader suggested they design. The Church on the Way in Van Nuys California (Los Angeles area –see map), where the church leader (Jack Hayford) ministered, no doubt reflected their own views and also one of the church’s members, Pat Boone, with whom they collaborated on the musical. They saw Jesus as the focus, but must have wondered at some point what of His divine message they should repeat in the production. He said many things, but which one was most important? Perhaps they put themselves in the shoes of the Apostles who also had a message to deliver (Matthew 10), and decided that the Master’s directions from that 1^st Century episode were still good enough two millennia later. It’s free. That’s what they thought would resonate with a broad group of people who needed to heed Jesus’ words. It was no accident what they predicted would result from this central theme, that people would “Come Together” as the musical’s title proclaimed. The Owens-Boone show went on the road, including England, in hundreds of venues. It started with a Messiah some 2,000 years before them who said his envoys should heal the sick, revive the dead, and point toward the Divine source – all for free. It would stun anyone in anytime to witness such events, something Carol must have surmised as she read from Matthew.  

Can you imagine what a sensation it was when Jesus came for a visit? ‘Just believe’, He said. No one went away sick, usually. Our medical practices today deliver far less and cost a lot more. He offers even more that no one here can pretend to mimic in even the smallest way. And, it’s still free, a foreign concept on this planet where priceless products always seem to have a price. So, that’s probably why the Owens song doesn’t have me focus on the methods He employs or the results of an encounter with Him, although those are fascinating details of a Jesus visit. Notice throughout her words that Carol says ‘in Jesus name’. I cannot buy what only He possesses. He’s the sensation.     

See more information on the song discussed above in this source: The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006.

The following websites have information on the church where the composer developed the song: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Church_on_the_Way

http://tcotw.org/home

Here’s a link to the broad movement in which the composer and her spouse found themselves at the time of the song’s composition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_movement

We Have an Anchor -- Priscilla Jane Owens

Was she a sailor, or just a fascinated observer of the sea? Or, perhaps she envisioned the words would be meaningful to the audience for whom she most often wrote – children. At least two organizations from her ancestral homeland have seemed to confirm that resonance. Did some of the members of those groups contact Priscilla Jane Owens in the latter half of the 19^th Century when she composed the poetry for “We Have an Anchor” (aka “Will Your Anchor Hold?”)? It would not have been surprising if that was so. It seems that she was also immersed in some Bible study, from where some of the words of her composition have a familiar ring.

Priscilla Owens most often wanted to instruct or inspire children when she wrote her verses, a mode that she recognized not only on Sundays but in her vocational walk too. As a teacher in Baltimore, most prominently in Sunday schools where she introduced songs for her young charges, she must have seen thousands of children come and go. Even by the time she was a mid-40-ish schoolmarm, this must have made an impression on her emotionally, psychologically. What was the best way to steer kids, who from any generation in any era have presented challenges for the adults? She must have been reading what Paul the Apostle wrote to a crowd (Hebrew 6:19) when she penned the words ‘steadfast and sure’ in describing an ‘anchor’. It must have struck her with some force, for she keeps up the mental imagery of the sea and how He protects us from the various hazards there. Had she experienced a seaborne trauma herself at some point, or were there children she knew to whom a seafaring experience was familiar? Priscilla must have been gratified to know that soon after her composition, the Boys Brigade adopted a motto and her hymn’s message as their own when that group was spawned by William Smith in Scotland (in 1883). The Dollar Academy’s adoption of her hymn in Scotland just a few years ago (2007) would have given Owens some joy, too, had she realized her teaching was still continuing 100 years after her death.  The Dollar Academy (founded in 1818), like the Boys Brigade, existed during Owens lifetime. Did she have the Boys and the Dollars in mind, among others, when she wrote?

‘We have an anchor’, Priscilla wrote, a reassurance that feels more meaningful amongst a group of believers, frankly. No one rides a boat alone. Were the Straits of Fear and Floods of Death (verses 3 and 4) real places in Owens’ experience? Maybe they were only imaginary, metaphorical, yet they need not be tangible to be dangerous, even deadly. She had never seen God, either, in human form, but believed in Him obviously, and in His capacity to gird us, though unseen. We’re all in this boat together.     

A very brief biographic note on the composer, plus all 5 verses that she wrote for the hymn:

http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/o/w/e/owens_pj.htm

More biography on composer: http://www.hymnary.org/person/Owens_Priscilla

Some background on the song’s inspiration: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Your_Anchor_Hold

The hymn is also closely associated with the organization described at the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boys%27_Brigade

The hymn is also an anthem at the following academy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dollar_Academy

Give Me the Bible -- Priscilla J. Owens

School teacher. Kids. Bible. Christian faith. Those few words could sum up what Priscilla Jane Owens’ life reflected, including what she composed in “Give Me the Bible” published in 1883.  What was it she viewed as she mulled over the words she thought children needed to hear most? Would it have been different for kids of that era versus those in other times? And, given what Owens had seen as a teacher for many years by that time, would the source of training and hope that she believed would hearten those she mentored have been a secret? Did she communicate the same in public schools as she did in Sunday schools? Did her experience in one guide her efforts in the other? These are all questions we’ll have to ask her later, but we can surmise some of her answers now. 

Fifty-four year old Priscilla had probably seen and taught hundreds, perhaps even thousands of children by the time she composed “Give Me the Bible”. She was an educator in Baltimore for some 50 years throughout her life, so as she approached her mid-50’s, Owens had seen a generation of youngsters enter and exit her classrooms. What impressed her as she wrote the four verses of this hymn, one among over 200 that she created, mostly for children? Each of the first three verses she penned conveys that she felt children arrived in her environment with troubles. They were ‘lone and tempest tossed’, had ‘broken’ hearts, felt ‘fear’ and ‘grief’, and walked in ‘gloom’. Not a very happy picture, huh? She had a counterpoint, however. The bible was no better place to start, a message she communicated on Sundays, both in the classroom and with her poetic pen. There’s no tentativeness to her approach in 1883. Her words are bold, right from the hymn’s first syllables.  We know not what specific kinds of issues she had seen in her public school role, as well as in her Sunday school position, but there must have been a myriad of them. But, was it different on Monday through Friday, versus on Sunday? We could guess that Sunday school kids needed less urging to open a bible – churchgoing parents would have already been compelling this behavior, right? On the other hand, what about the kids in her public school classrooms? Did she see they needed this instruction, perhaps in a greater way? 

Perhaps what she couldn’t explicitly verbalize for kids, she wrote in her poems. Her beliefs could have been read by any of her students in the Meth­od­ist Pro­test­ant and the Chris­tian Stan­dard, where her poems were published. It must have been an effective technique, for she wrote some 230 hymns that we still have. That’s about four or five lesson-poems for her students per year, over the 50 years that Priscilla occupied a classroom. Many have lasted well beyond her lifetime, so we could say she was prophetic, in a way. A prophet’s message is from Him, and generally outlives its messenger’s mortality.  She’s still teaching. And, the bible’s still in print.

A very brief biographic note on the composer, plus all 4 verses that she wrote for the hymn:

http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/o/w/e/owens_pj.htm

http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/g/i/v/givemetb.htm

More biography on composer: http://www.hymnary.org/person/Owens_Priscilla