Scripture Verse

As the Father has sent Me, I am sending you. John 20:21

Introduction

portrait
Charles E. Prior
(1856–1927)

Words: Ma­ry Brown, in Our Best En­dea­vor (Sil­ver Bur­dett: 1892) (verse 1), and Charles E. Pri­or (vers­es 2–3). The orig­in­al ti­tle was Go Stand and Speak, with mu­sic by Pri­or.

Music: Car­rie E. Roun­se­fell, 1894 (🔊 pdf nwc). She wrote the tune for these words, for use in a re­viv­al meet­ing at the Bap­tist church in Lynn, Mas­sa­chu­setts.

If you know where to get a good pho­to of Brown or Roun­se­fell (head & shoul­ders, at least 200×300 pix­els),

This well known mis­sion­ary and con­se­cra­tion hymn was adopt­ed by a class of ov­er a hun­dred mis­sion­ary nurs­es at the Bat­tle Creek (Mi­chi­gan) Sa­ni­ta­ri­um as their class hymn. Ev­ery Sun­day af­ter­noon they would ga­ther for a so­cial meet­ing and al­ways sing [it]…

In this class were stu­dents from near­ly ev­ery State of the Un­ion, from Aus­tral­ia, South Af­ri­ca, South Am­eri­ca, Bul­gar­ia, Ar­men­ia, and near­ly all the Eu­ro­pe­an coun­tries. At the close of the course they agreed that af­ter they had part­ed and gone to their dif­fer­ent fields, they would sing this hymn ev­ery Sun­day as they had done dur­ing their hap­py class-days.

Sankey, pp. 163–64

Lyrics

It may not be on the mount­ain’s height,
Or over the stor­my sea;
It may not be at the bat­tle’s front
My Lord will have need of me;
But if by a still, small voice He calls
To paths I do not know,
I’ll an­swer, dear Lord, with my hand in Thine,
I’ll go where You want me to go.

Refrain

I’ll go where You want me to go, dear Lord,
O’er mount­ain, or plain, or sea;
I’ll say what You want me to say, dear Lord,
I’ll be what You want me to be.

Perhaps today there are lov­ing words
Which Je­sus would have me speak;
There may be now, in the paths of sin,
Some wan­d’rer whom I should seek.
O Sav­ior, if Thou wilt be my guide,
Tho’ dark and rug­ged the way,
My voice shall echo the mes­sage sweet,
I’ll say what You want me to say.

Refrain

There’s sure­ly some­where a low­ly place
In earth’s har­vest fields so wide,
Where I may la­bor thro’ life’s short day
For Je­sus, the Cru­ci­fied.
So, trust­ing my all unto Thy care,
I know Thou lov­est me!
I’ll do Thy will with a heart sin­cere,
I’ll be what You want me to be.

Refrain