Blessed Assurance by Fanny Crosby

Born: March 24, 1820, Put­nam Coun­ty, New York.

Died: Feb­ru­a­ry 12, 1915, Bridge­port, Con­nec­ti­cut.

Buried: Bridge­port, Con­nec­ti­cut.

Fanny Crosby was prob­ab­ly the most pro­lif­ic hymn­ist in his­to­ry. Though blind­ed by an in­com­pe­tent doc­tor at six weeks of age, she wrote over 8,000 hymns.

About her blind­ness, she said:

It seemed intend­ed by the bless­ed prov­i­dence of God that I should be blind all my life, and I thank him for the dis­pen­sa­tion. If per­fect earth­ly sight were of­fered me to­mor­row I would not ac­cept it. I might not have sung hymns to the praise of God if I had been dis­tract­ed by the beau­ti­ful and in­ter­est­ing things about me.

In her life­time, Fan­ny Cros­by was one of the best known wo­men in the Unit­ed States. To this day, the vast ma­jor­i­ty of Amer­i­can hymn­als con­tain her work.

When Fanny died, her tomb­stone car­ried the words, “Aunt Fan­ny” and “Bless­ed as­sur­ance, Jesus is mine. Oh, what a fore­taste of glo­ry di­vine.”

Blessèd assurance, Jesus is mine!

O what a foretaste of glory divine!

Heir of salvation, purchase of God,

Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.

Refrain

This is my story, this is my song,

Praising my Savior, all the day long;

This is my story, this is my song,

Praising my Savior, all the day long.

Perfect submission, perfect delight,

Visions of rapture now burst on my sight;

Angels descending bring from above

Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.

Refrain

Perfect submission, all is at rest

I in my Savior am happy and blest,

Watching and waiting, looking above,

Filled with His goodness, lost in His love.

Refrain