Frances Ridley Havergal

Frances Ridley Havergal was born on December 14, 1836, in Astley, Worcestershire, England. She was the youngest child of William Henry Havergal, an Anglican clergyman who was also a composer and hymn writer. She grew up in a home full of music and faith, and she was an exceptionally gifted girl. She learned to read at the age of four, and she was writing verse by the age of seven. She had a quick mind and mastered several languages, including Greek, Hebrew, French, German and Italian. She also had a fine voice and was a gifted pianist.

Her mother died when Frances was eleven, and the loss left a lasting mark on her. She was sent to boarding school, where she was lively but also troubled by a sense of her need for Christ. She went through years of religious struggle, longing for the assurance of salvation. In 1851, at the age of fourteen, she came to a settled trust in Christ, and from that day she devoted her life to Him. Her father's example had a strong influence on her.

She studied in Germany for a time and returned to England to live with her father. She was able to give music lessons and to write. She wrote poems and hymns that expressed her love for the Lord, and they were soon published in magazines. Her hymns were marked by their simplicity and warmth. Among her best known are Take My Life and Let It Be Consecrated, Who Is on the Lord's Side, Lord Speak to Me and Like a River Glorious. She wrote the hymn Take My Life in 1874, after a visit to a house where several people were unconverted. She prayed for them, and she said that God gave her the hope that all in the house would be saved. That night she wrote the lines of the hymn.

She was also very generous. She gave away her jewelry, which she had inherited from her family, to the Church Missionary Society in 1878. She kept only a few small items. She wrote that she had never been so happy as when she had given up her treasures for the work of Christ. She was a keen supporter of missions and of the work among the poor.

Her health was always delicate. She suffered from weak lungs and from a number of illnesses. She spent many months in bed. She did not complain, and she used her times of weakness to write and pray. She often said that she wished to be used by God, and she held that suffering could be a means of grace. She was a woman of great joy, though she was often in pain.

She never married. She was known for her cheerful spirit and her devotion to her family. She also attended the Keswick Convention and was moved by the teaching on the deeper life. She said that she had found a deeper peace in surrender to Christ.

She died on June 3, 1879, at Caswell Bay, in Wales, at the age of forty-two. Her last words were of the joy of seeing the Lord. Her hymns continue to be sung in churches around the world, and her life shows that a short life lived with a full surrender can bear lasting fruit.