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A Heavenly Hymn

What used to be considered the words to an old familiar hymn became an imprint of a resounding call to live life with eyes of faith. After a 2 year battle with cancer, my husband, Ethan (Yong Min), went home to be with the Lord. He spent 10 days at the hospice as I fearfully awaited that dreaded moment when he would take his last breath. My friend, Sara, was helping me care for him at the hospice when that hour finally arrived. As my husband was taking his last breaths on this earth, Sara softly sang the chorus of the hymn “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” as I held him one last time and let him go to meet his Maker.

Since Ethan’s passing, I often dwelled on the words to this song as they enveloped my last moments together with him. So I took a personal interest in finding the source of inspiration to this hymn. It was written by Helen Howarth Lemmel, a daughter of a Methodist pastor. She had extraordinary musical abilities and could’ve succeeded as a professional singer, yet she chose to use her talent as a form of ministry to serve God. However, her life was not free of trials. She was married to a wealthy European man who left her after she became blind. In spite of the heartaches, she continued to fix her eyes on her Savior. In 1918, at the age of 54, Helen was given a Gospel tract by a missionary friend. In this pamphlet was written a statement that convicted her heart: “So then, turn your eyes upon Him, look full into His face and you will find that the things of earth will acquire a strange new dimness.” Within that week, the hymn “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” was born and later published in 1922. Along with many other hymns that Helen wrote, this one was composed while she was blind.

This Gospel tract that inspired Helen was called, Focused. It was written by Lilias Trotter who was a missionary to Muslims in Algeria. She was also an extremely gifted Victorian-era artist who came from an upper class background. She was on a path to becoming one of the most successful artists of her era. Yet, at the age of 35, she chose to leave that behind to become a missionary to the Muslims to fulfill her passion to invest in God’s Kingdom. When I discovered how she lived out her faith, her words in her Gospel tract became so much more powerful.

Lilias Trotter and Helen Lemmel were both women who invested in the treasures of Heaven. They looked beyond what the world can give them because their eyes were fixed on the perfecter of their faith. Another excerpt of Focused reads: “How do we bring things to a focus in the world of optics? Not by looking at the things to be dropped, but by looking at the one point that is to be brought out.” This is what Ethan did when he was given the cancer diagnosis on February 2006. Initially our world was shaken because one month before hearing the bad news, we discovered I was pregnant with our third child. We were still in the beginning stages of building a family as my boys were ages 2 and 4 at the time. Ethan was a successful structural engineer working for the government. He had a heart of worship and served God through praise and music. He also had plans to begin seminary training to fulfill a calling to enter fulltime ministry. There were so many plans and dreams yet to be fulfilled on this earth. When we looked at our situation through our own eyes, it didn’t make any sense why God would take such a young man home so early.

As much as he knew that God was able to heal him, he accepted the fact that the decision was not up to him. So out of obedience, he focused on Christ and let Him speak through his illness. He poured out his life and bared his soul through his writings as a testimony to share with others about God. When he began doing this, God unveiled a greater view of eternity, and his worries about what will happen to me and the kids began to fade. He rested his eyes on Jesus and decided to let Him take care of the rest. As much as he wanted to behold this life, he wanted Jesus more. So rather than allowing his cancer to overtake his life, he let God use the cancer to overtake others’ lives. During his last days at the hospice, he told a group of brothers and sisters, “If God can use my trial and even my death to save a single soul, I would do it all over again.” On May of 2008, Ethan went home to be with the Lord at the age of 36.

I cannot deny the deep loss I felt when Ethan passed away. The pain and sorrow still remain, but in exchange for the loss, God gave me a beautiful gift. It was the gift of an eternal perspective. When the world sees a widow with three young children, they see a tragedy. But when I fix my eyes on Christ, He enables me to see beyond my circumstances. As the words to the hymn continue to ring truth in my ears, I am reminded of living this life with eternity’s values in view. “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2)

Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus

O soul, are you weary and troubled?

No light in the darkness you see?

There’s light for a look at the Savior,

And life more abundant and free!

Chorus:

Turn your eyes upon Jesus

Look full in His wonderful face

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace.

Thro’ death into life everlasting

He passed, and we follow Him there;

Over us sin no more hath dominion

For more than conquerors we are!

His word shall not fail you He promised;

Believe Him, and all will be well,

Then go to a world that is dying,

His perfect salvation to tell!

For those interested in reading about Ethan’s journey, here is a link to his blog: www.xanga.com/nathansdad