Scripture Verse

Any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be My disciple. Luke 14:33

Introduction

portrait
Judson W. Van DeVenter (1855–1939)

Words: Jud­son W. Van De­Ven­ter, 1896. Pub­lished in The Young Peo­ple’s Hym­nal, ed­it­ed by James At­kins & Will­iam J. Kirk­pat­rick (Nash­ville, Ten­nes­see: Pub­lish­ing House, Me­tho­dist Epis­co­pal Church, South, 1897), num­ber 7.

Music: Win­field S. Weed­en, 1896 (🔊 pdf nwc). Wee­den pub­lished a num­ber of books of re­li­gious mu­sic, but this song must have been one of his fa­vo­rites: its ti­tle was on his tomb­stone.

If you have a bet­ter pho­to of Van De­Ven­ter or Weed­en,

portrait
Winfield S. Weeden (1847–1908)

Origin of the Song

The song was writ­ten while I was con­duct­ing a meet­ing at East Pal­es­tine, Ohio, in the home of George Se­bring (found­er of the Se­bring Camp­meet­ing Bi­ble Con­fer­ence in Se­bring, Ohio, and lat­er de­vel­op­er of the town of Se­bring, Flo­ri­da).

For some time, I had strug­gled be­tween de­vel­op­ing my tal­ents in the field of art and going into full-time ev­an­gel­is­tic work.

At last the pi­vo­tal hour of my life came, and I surr­endered all. A new day was ush­ered in­to my life. I be­came an ev­an­gel­ist and dis­covered down deep in my soul a tal­ent hi­ther­to un­known to me.

God had hid­den a song in my heart, and touch­ing a ten­der chord, He caused me to sing.

Judson Van De­Ven­ter

Lyrics

All to Je­sus, I sur­ren­der;
All to Him I free­ly give;
I will ev­er love and trust Him,
In His pre­sence dai­ly live.

Refrain

I sur­ren­der all, I sur­ren­der all,
All to Thee, my bless­èd Sav­ior,
I sur­ren­der all.

All to Je­sus I sur­ren­der;
Humbly at His feet I bow,
Worldly plea­sures all for­sak­en;
Take me, Je­sus, take me now.

Refrain

All to Je­sus, I sur­ren­der;
Make me, Sav­ior, whol­ly Thine;
Let me feel the Ho­ly Spi­rit,
Truly know that Thou art mine.

Refrain

All to Je­sus, I sur­ren­der;
Lord, I give my­self to Thee;
Fill me with Thy love and power;
Let Thy bless­ing fall on me.

Refrain

All to Je­sus I sur­ren­der;
Now I feel the sac­red flame.
O the joy of full sal­va­tion!
Glory, glo­ry, to His name!

Refrain