“So Send I You”
So send I you to labor unrewarded,
To serve unpaid, unloved, unsought, unknown,
To bear rebuke, to suffer scorn and scoffing,
So send I you to toil for me alone.
So send I you – to loneliness and longing,
With heart a-hungering for the loved and known;
Forsaking home and kindred, friend and dear one,
So send I you – to know my love alone.
So send I you – to leave your life’s ambitions,
To die to dear desire, self-will resign,
To labor long and love where men revile you,
So send I you – to lose your life in mine.
Edith Margaret Clarkson was born this date 6/8/1915 at Melville, Saskatchewan, Canada. She wrote “So Send I You” and God of Creation, All-Powerful. She died 3/17/2008 in Toronto. “So Send I You” has been called the greatest missionary hymn of the twentieth century.
Thanks for posting Margaret Clarkson’s fine hymn. She was born not far from where we live now, and I met her a few years ago.
Did you know that she came to believe her hymn was too negative? Not that it was untrue, but it needed to be balanced by a hymn that spoke of God’s grace equipping us for victory and fruitfulness. A decade later she wrote a second “So Send I You.” Here are a couple of stanzas:
So send I you–by grace made strong to triumph
O’er hosts of hell, o’er darkness, death and sin,
My name to bear and in that name to conquer–
So send I you, My victory to win.
So send I you–My strength to know in weakness,
My joy in grief, My perfect peace in pain,
To prove My pow’r, My grace, My promised presence–
So send I you, eternal fruit to gain.
If you love our traditional hymns, I encourage you to check out my daily blog, Wordwise Hymns. God bless.