Rick Sample
Field Personnel in the San Francisco Bay Area, CA
I’ve always loved hymns. I like to say that I’ve been going to Baptist churches since nine months before I was born. My earliest church memories were singing the hymns. In the church where my father was pastor when I was a preschooler, on Sunday nights, they had the congregation request the hymns that would be sung. As a four-year-old I always requested (every Sunday night) “O How I Love Jesus.” Thankfully, that song leader was always patient with me and led that hymn. I begged to be allowed to sing in the choir one Sunday morning. I remember drowning in an adult choir robe and tripping on its hem as I walked proudly into the choir loft.
By the age of 12, as a precocious tween, I had memorized most of the hymn numbers in the Baptist Hymnal, 1956 edition. I used to entertain my friends with this very specific and very valuable knowledge. “Go ahead, test me.” #41 To God Be the Glory. #95 Glory to His Name. #143 I Will Sing of My Redeemer. #196 I Must Needs Go Home by the Way of the Cross. #300 Let the Lower Lights Be Burning. #482 When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder. The Christmas carols were #63-81. And, of course, #188 Amazing Grace. I could go on.
When I lived in Alabama, I always loved going with my grandmother to a good old gospel singing at her rural church. I sang in my high school choir and then in the Baptist Student Union (BSU) choir at Samford University. I’ve sung in church choirs in Michigan, Alabama, Texas, North Carolina and California. I always love the hymn arrangements in those choirs and we baritones usually had expressive vocal lines. I’ve always felt that the traditional hymns have such good theology and are very inspirational in the sense that they inspire one to greater faith. Sometimes when I pray, I pray through the lyrics from my first favorite hymn.
Prayer
There is a name I love to hear,
I love to sing its worth;
it sounds like music in mine ear,
the sweetest name on earth.
Refrain:
O how I love Jesus,
O how I love Jesus,
O how I love Jesus,
because he first loved me!
It tells me of a Savior’s love,
who died to set me free;
it tells me of his precious blood,
the sinner’s perfect plea. [Refrain]
It tells of one whose loving heart
can feel my deepest woe;
who in each sorrow bears a part,
that none can bear below. [Refrain]