Scripture Verse

Having no hope, and without God in the world. Ephesians 2:12

Introduction

portrait
William O. Cushing
1823–1902

Words: Will­iam O. Cush­ing, in Wel­come Tid­ings, by Ro­bert Low­ry, W. How­ard Doane & Ira D. San­key (New York: Big­low & Main, 1877), num­ber 37.

Music: Ro­bert Low­ry (🔊 pdf nwc).

If you know where to get a bet­ter pho­to of Cush­ing, would you ?

portrait
Robert Lowry
1826–1899

From the “Res­cue Mis­sion” of Syr­a­cuse, New York, comes this in­ci­dent. “One of the work­ers at the Res­cue Mis­sion sat at the win­dow sew­ing. She is not a grand sing­er, in fact, scarce­ly ev­er sings in the meet­ing; but alone by her­self she sings the Gos­pel songs. She was sing­ing:

Oh, to have no Christ, no Saviour…
How dark this world must be!

When she had finished she heard some one call­ing, and saw two girls look­ing over a neigh­bor­ing fence. One said: ‘Won’t you please sing that again?’

“I am afraid some of us would have be­gun to make ex­cuse, and say we were not good sing­ers. But this soul sang it ov­er again, pray­ing God to bless the song, and then went to talk with them. She re­cog­nized them as in­mates of a house of ev­il re­sort, and asked pe­rmis­sion to call on them. They would not grant this, but the next day one came to the mis­sion and threw her­self, weep­ing, into the arms of the sing­er, say­ing: ‘I have been so un­hap­py since I heard you sing!

‘You remind me of my good moth­er and the days when I was in­no­cent and good. I had a good home, but quar­reled with my moth­er, ran away and got in­to a life of sin; I am tired of it, won’t you pray for me?’ They had pray­er, and the poor wan­der­ing one was led to the Sav­iour. She said: ‘I’ll ne­ver go back to that place again. I’m going to the poor-mas­ter and ask him to send me home.’

The work­er fur­nished the mo­ney to pay her fare to her home in a neigh­bor­ing ci­ty, and she went away re­joic­ing. This was some time ago. One ev­en­ing the girl, ac­com­pa­nied by her fa­ther, paid a visit to the mis­sion. She was hap­py in Christ, and had led ele­ven souls to Him, her fa­ther and mo­ther be­ing among the num­ber. Her fa­ther was full of praise and thanks­giv­ing to God for what He had done for his err­ing child, and tears ran down his cheeks as he thanked the sing­er for the song, and for the help she had been to his daugh­ter. Her de­sire is to work among the fall­en ones from among whom she was res­cued.

Sankey, pp. 202–03

Lyrics

Oh, to have no Christ, no Savior!
No rock, no refuge nigh!
When the dark days ’round thee gather,
When the storms sweep o’er the sky!

Refrain

Oh, to have no hope in Jesus!
No friend, no light in Jesus!
Oh, to have no hope in Jesus!
How dark this world must be!

Oh, to have no Christ, no Savior!
How lonely life must be!
Like a sailor, lost and driven,
On a wide and shoreless sea.

Refrain

Oh, to have no Christ, no Savior!
No hand to clasp thine own!
Thro’ the dark, dark vale of shadows,
Thou must press thy way alone.

Refrain

Now, we pray thee, come to Jesus;
His pardoning love receive;
For the Savior now is calling,
And He bids thee turn and live.

Come to Jesus, He will save you;
He is the friend of sinners;
Then, when thou hast found the Savior,
How bright this world will be!