Introduction

Words & Mu­sic: Phi­lip P. Bliss, 1870 (🔊 pdf nwc).

I think it was in June, 1870, that Je­sus Loves Me was writ­ten. Mr. and Mrs. Bliss were at that time mem­bers of my fa­mi­ly, at 43 South May street, Chi­ca­go [Il­li­nois].

One morn­ing, Mrs. Bliss came down to break­fast and said, as she en­tered the room: Last night Mr. Bliss had a tune giv­en to him that I think is going to live and be one of the most used that he has writ­ten. I have been sing­ing it all morn­ing to my­self and can­not get it out of my mind. She then sang ov­er to us the notes of Jesus Loves Me.

The idea of Bliss in writ­ing it was that the peace and com­fort of a Chris­tian were not found­ed up­on his lov­ing Christ, but up­on Christ’s love to him, and that to oc­cu­py the mind with Christ’s love, would pro­duce love and con­se­cra­tion…How much God has used this lit­tle song to lead sin­ners and doubt­ing Chris­tians to look away to Je­sus, eter­ni­ty alone can tell.

Whittle, p. 130

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Mr. Bliss said that this song was sug­gest­ed to him by hear­ing the cho­rus of the hymn Oh, how I love Je­sus, re­peat­ed ve­ry fre­quent­ly in a meet­ing which he at­tend­ed.

After join­ing in the cho­rus a num­ber of times the thought came to him, Have I not been sing­ing enough about my poor love for Je­sus, and shall I not rath­er sing of his great love for me? Under the im­pulse of this thought he went home and com­posed this, one of his most po­pu­lar child­ren’s hymns.

Sankey, pp. 176–77