My Faith Looks Up to Thee

‘’My Zeal Inspire’’ On an autumn day nearly 200 years ago, Ray Palmer met his friend Lowell Mason on a busy Boston street. Mason was a collector and publisher of hymns, and he asked Palmer if he had recently seen any good religious verse. Palmer thought a moment, then pulled out a little book in which he jotted down his own thoughts 825 and poems.

He showed Mason a particular poem he had earlier written as a personal prayer to the Lord. Palmer, a theology student in his early twenties, had a passion for the Lord, and as he showed Mason his poem he recalled the night, two years previously, when he had sat alone at his desk on an early winter’s evening and wept over the words he’d written.

To him., this was a sacred text conveying the craving of his life, uttering his deepest prayer to the Lord, and he showed it to his friends hesitantly. Mason, reading the lines, was immediately moved. Ducking into a store together, the words were copied and Mason put the copy in his pocket. Arriving home, he was so deeply touched by Palmer’s verses that he immediately set them to music.

Two days later the two men chanced to meet again. “Mr. Palmer,” Mason said, “you may leave many years and do many good things, but I think you will be best-known to posterity as the author of “My Faith Looks Up to Thee.”

Mason was right. The words that had so moved the two men include this stanza which has worded the prayers of several generations of Christians since: May Thy rich grace impart Strength ro my fainting heart, My zeal inspire; As Thou hast died for me, 0 may my love ro Thee, Pure, warm, and changeless be, A living fire!