On vacation in Germany, Frances Ridley Havergal was tired from a busy day of sightseeing. As she sat down to rest, she noticed a painting of the crucified Christ on the wall. The eyes of Jesus seemed to be focused on her. Then she noticed that underneath the painting was the inscription: “I did this for thee; what hast thou done for me?”
Immediately, an idea for a hymn flashed through her mind, and she took a pencil and scribbled down some words on a scrap of paper. Then as she read the words again, she thought the poem was very poor, so she crumpled the paper up and tossed it into the fire. It fell to the side of the flames, however, and didn’t burn. She then picked up the crumpled paper and put it in her purse.
Months later she showed it to her father, who suggested that the poem was worth publishing, and soon her hymn “I Gave My Life for Thee” was being sung in churches on both sides of the Atlantic. “What can I offer the Lord for all he has done for me?” asked the psalmist. It’s a daunting question for any of us. Scottish minister Samuel Rutherford called himself a “drowned debtor to God’s mercy” and explained that he was “over head and ears in debt to God.” Aren’t we all? I gave my life for thee, my precious blood I shed, That thou might’st ransomed be, and quickened from the dead; I gave, I gave my life for thee; what hast thou given for me?
FRANCES R. HAVERGAL