Fanny Crosby, Part3

Fanny Crosby became very well known and as a result, formed friendships with many influential and important people. Among them were Presidents VanBuren, Polk, and Cleveland, Also Henry Clay, Jenny Lind, and others. Her works were appreciated by many.
At age 27 she became an instructor in the Blind Institute she had been a student in. At age 31, or so say many sites, Fanny became a Christian. At age 37, in March 1858 Fanny Crosby was married to Alexander VanAlstyne, also a blind student.
She met William Bradbury, a musical composer, around 1863, and he encouraged her to write what became her first hymn. It began, “We are going, we are going ,To a home beyond the skies,”. During the years that were to follow Fanny Crosby wrote many hymns. Her First hymn to win attention was “Pass me not Oh gentle Savior”, written at the suggestion of her friend William H. Doane. This opened the floodgates of hymns that followed.
According to http://www.earnestlycontending.com/KT/bios/fannycrosby.html, “The years that saw her more famous songs first published were as follows: 1867 More Like Jesus; 1868 Safe In The Arms Of Jesus (wrote); 1869 Near The Cross, Praise Him; 1870 Pass Me Not, Rescue The Perishing; 1871 To The Work; 1873 Blessed Assurance, To God Be The Glory; 1874 Close To Thee; 1875 I Am Thine 0 Lord, All The Way My Saviour Leads Me, Saviour More Than Life To Me; 1876 Tho Your Sins Be As Scarlet, Will Jesus Find Us Watching; 1880 Tis The Blessed Hour Of Prayer; 1882 Redeemer; 1883 Jesus Is Calling; 1887 He Is Coming Man Of Sorrows (Alice Monteith pseudonym) 1890 He Hideth My Soul; 1894 Saved By Grace, 1 Shall Know Him.”*

In 1915, at the Age of 95, Fanny Crosby died. Her Hymns and the story of her life live on in the hearts of many. The poem below is written by Eliza Hewitt, and recited at her funeral.

Away to the country of sunshine and song,
Our songbird has taken her flight,
And she who has sung in the darkness so long
Now sings in the beautiful light;
The harp-strings here broken are sweetly restrung
To ring in a chorus sublime;
The hymns that on earth she so trustfully sung
Keep tune with eternity’s chime!

What heart can conceive of the rapture she knows
Awakened to glories so bright,
Where radiant splendor unceasingly glows,
Where cometh no shadows of night!
Her ‘life-work is ended,’ and over the tide,
‘Redeemed’ in His presence to stand,
She knows her Redeemer, for her crucified,
‘By the print of the nails in His hand.’

‘Blessed Assurance’—the lamp in her soul
That made earthly midnight as naught!
A ‘New Song’ of joy shall unceasingly roll
To Him who her ransom had bought.
To ‘Rescue the Perishing,’ her greatest delight,
What bliss, in the Homeland, to meet
With those she has told of the Lord’s saving might,
Together, to bow at His feet.

Good-bye, dearest Fanny, goodbye for a while,
You walk in the shadows no more;
Around you, the sunbeams of glory will smile;
The Lamb is the Light of that Shore!
Someday we will meet in the City above;
Together, we’ll look on His face;
Safe, ‘Safe in the Arms’ of the Jesus we love;
Together we’ll sing, ‘Saved by Grace!’

Thank you for Reading,
Esther

Many thanks to:
http://www.earnestlycontending.com/KT/bios/fannycrosby.html
http://www.cyberhymnal.org/bio/c/r/o/crosby_fj.htm
and
Heroes of the Faith Biography “Fanny Crosby, The Hymn writer” written by Bernard Ruffin