Cleanse Me (Search Me, O God) -- James Edwin Orr

They were saying ‘good-bye’, and he must have felt like he didn’t want it to end. Or did he? James Edwin Orr had been visiting New Zealand, and he experienced something over those few days that he wanted to never forget. It was an episode he wanted to remember so much, that he studied about it for the next several decades, starting with some words he called “Search Me, O God” (some call it “Cleanse Me”). But, there was a part of that departure that he must have felt was positive, something that was indeed necessary to usher out and bid ‘good riddance’. Perhaps that’s what made it so easy for Orr to compose words to match the tune he’d just heard, in the context of what he’d witnessed among many new believers in that island nation in 1936.

Twenty-four year old James Orr was on an Easter mission campaign to the South Pacific during the mid-1930’s, an event that had a profound impact on his life, reflected in the words he recorded in just a few moments. The site was Ngaruawahia, a town on the northern island of New Zealand (see map).

Orr’s messages to eager students during his stay there were convicting, motivating many to make decisions for Christ – a true revival. Perhaps his own words to listeners had contained the themes he would later record in the poem, that a convert must be willing to depart from old ways to invite God into one’s life. His listeners weren’t the only ones affected. As he was serenaded by native Maori women who wanted to say farewell with a song, Orr was touched. Something about music tends to stick in a person’s mind, as Orr would no doubt confirm if he were still here to ask. Some call it a medical, neurological phenomenon. Or, is it just because God has wired us that way, to let the Spirit reach us in this mode? Whatever the case, Orr’s mind kept replaying the Maori women’s heartfelt wishes, and words flowed from his mind onto the back of an envelope as he was in a local post office. It kicked off the next several decades of his life apparently, as he studied revivals and travelled the world, taking this poem-Maori farewell fusion product with him.

 The tune was about farewell, and perhaps its original purpose was why it fit so well with what Orr wanted to motivate.  He wanted a revival, and what would that require? His own thoughts drifted to those of another songwriter from centuries before. The David who recorded the words of Psalm 139’s last two stanzas was a guy who needed someone – God – to clean him up before he could go forward. This ancient king was as fallible as you or me, though he’s remembered as ‘the man after God’s own heart’(Acts 13:22). His thoughts directly before the ones in Psalm 139 that stirred James Orr three millennia later were unvarnished evil – hatred and slaying of enemies. It must have occurred to the king that he, God’s chosen, was nevertheless occasionally a bloodthirsty reprobate.  Can that person and God inhabit the same space? You know the answer, don’t you? James Edwin Orr did too, and convinced many others to ask themselves the same question. Say good-bye to the hating, slaying you.

The following website has a soundtrack for the song: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/s/e/a/searchme.htm

See the site here for rendition of the native farewell song that is the tune the composer adopted for this hymn: http://folksong.org.nz/poatarau/

See more information on the song discussed above in The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006.  Also, see Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1990; and Then Sings My Soul – 150 of the World’s Greatest Hymn Stories, Robert J. Morgan, Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2003.