I have found that heartbreak can give voice to healing and hope. This makes no sense except for the divine, unfathomable truth that our God, the Living Word, put on flesh and entered into our despair to redeem with His perfect love all that had been lost.
When my mom told me the story of how “It Is Well With My Soul” was written, I sat there with her and wept.
In 1871, a man by the name of Horatio G. Spafford had been living a good life in Chicago with his wife, Anna, and their four daughters. At the time, Spafford was a successful lawyer and real estate investor, as well as an elder in his Presbyterian church. They were friends with and supporters of the evangelist Dwight L. Moody. That year, tragedy struck when the Great Chicago Fire ravaged the city October 8-10. At least three hundred people perished, around one hundred thousand were left homeless, and $200 million worth of property was destroyed, including Spafford’s real estate investments and law firm.
By 1873, Spafford was concerned about Anna’s health and decided to send his family on vacation to England where they would also be attending revival services held by Moody. When their finances took another hit by the Panic of 1873, Spafford was detained by last-minute business concerns, so he sent his wife and four daughters, aged eleven, nine, five, and two, on the French steamship Ville du Havre ahead of him. One week into the trip, the Ville du Havre collided with the iron-hulled Scottish ship Loch Earn, snapping the French ship in half.
Anna woke her daughters and took them onto the deck as she cried out to God to either save them or make them willing to die. Within twelve minutes, the ship sank into the icy waters of the Atlantic, taking the lives of 226 of the 313 souls on the Ville du Havre, including Horatio and Anna’s four daughters. Anna was found clinging to a piece of the wreckage, rescued, and taken to Cardiff, Wales, where she penned a telegraph, sent by the Western Union Telegraph Company to Spafford, that said, “Saved alone. What shall I do?”
Spafford immediately left Chicago to meet his wife in Liverpool. As he crossed the Atlantic, the captain called Spafford to his cabin at one point and told him that, to the best of his recollection, they were over the place where his daughters had perished. According to one of Spafford’s daughters born after the tragedy, her father wrote some of “It Is Well with My Soul” while on this journey.
When peace like a river attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well with my soul.Chorus:
It is well with my soul,
It is well, it is well with my soul.
In 1876, Ira Sankey, a known gospel singer associated with Dwight L. Moody, stayed in Horatio and Anna’s home for a couple of weeks. According to Sankey, this was when all of the words to the hymn were written in commemoration of the death of the Spaffords’ four daughters. The music for the hymn was composed by Phillip P. Bliss and officially published by Bliss and Sankey. It was first sung by Bliss before a large gathering hosted by Moody on November 4, 1876.
Heartbreakingly, these events were not the end of the Spaffords’ sorrows. A son, Horatio Gates Spafford II, was born to them in 1877, but he died of scarlet fever before he turned five. However, the Spaffords had two more daughters, Bertha and Grace, born in 1878 and 1881. “It Is Well With My Soul” is a “worship anyway” sort of song. The Spaffords’ heartbreak gave voice to healing and hope to countless generations who still sing the words, “It is well with my soul.”
This story is a harrowing reminder to us that, whatever losses we have suffered, whatever endings or changes we have walked through, we may choose to lift up our weary heads and worship anyway. As we command our souls to sing, declaring in faith, “It is well,” may we become cognizant of the goodness of God and recover and heal from the heartbreak while regaining the strength to find joy again as gratitude willingly spills out of our mouths.
Remember, grief and gratitude can go hand in hand: choosing gratitude is a powerful force, but it doesn’t erase the heartache and loss you may still feel.
Andi Andrew joins Randy and Tammy this Monday on LIFE TODAY. Excerpted from Braving Change by Andi Andrew. Copyright ©2024 by Andi Andrew. Published by Baker Books, a division of Baker Publishing Group. Used by permission.
