Sweet Hour of Prayer

Author: William W. Walford, 1772-1850
Music: William B. Bradbury, 1816-1868
Download the Music: Sweet Hour of Prayer
Audio Only: Sweet Hour of Prayer
Themes: Prayer, Comfort, Hope

Scripture References:

Deut 34:1 – Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho. And the LORD showed him all the land, Gilead as far as Dan

Matt 7:11 – If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!

Matt 21:22 – And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.

Acts 3:1 – Now Peter and John were going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.

Eph 6:18 – praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,

HISTORY

William Walford of Coleshill, England was a blind wood-carver by trade and the owner of a small trinket shop. He was also a devout Christian and often the guest preacher in the churches around the area where he lived. William composed sermons in his head to deliver on Sundays. He memorized a huge portions of the Bible, which he quoted verbatim in his sermons. Some of his folk thought he had memorized the entire Scripture, cover to cover. William also composed lines of verse, and he prayed.

One day in 1842, the Reverend Thomas Salmon, a New York native who spent time in Coleskill, Warwickshire, England, where he became acquainted with William. He tells this tale of what happened one day, while he was visiting the blind pastor: “…he repeated two or three pieces which he had composed, and having no friend at home to commit them to paper, he had laid them up in the storehouse within. “How will this do?” asked he, as he repeated the following lines, with a complacent smile touched with some light lines of fear, lest he subject himself to criticism. I rapidly copied the lines with my pencil, as he uttered them.

The first verse went like this:

Sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer
That calls me from a world of care
And bids me at my Father’s throne
Make all my wants and wishes known
In seasons of distress and grief
My soul has often found relief
And oft’ escaped the tempter’s snare
By thy return, sweet hour of prayer.

Three years later, Reverend Salmon was in New York city and, while there, took the old wood-carver’s poem along to the editor of the New York Observer. As a result, Sweet Hour of Prayer appeared in the September 13, 1845 issue.

Nothing happened for another fourteen years. William Bradbury, a famous composer, set the poem to music and turned it into one of the most famous hymns of all time. Lifted on the wings of Bradbury’s beautiful melody, the words soon sped around the globe and in a short time, were being sung by millions.

William Walford’s physical blindness did not affect his spiritual insight. The eyes of his soul could see perfectly clear.

Beyond the few details recorded by Reverend Thomas Salmon, we know little of William Walford. His hymn, Sweet Hour of Prayer, has touched hundreds of thousands of lives on both sides of the Atlantic, expressing the genuine joy he found in prayer.

Two things struck me as I studied the history of this song:

1. Neither Rev. Walford nor Rev. Salmon ever knew that these verses would become a much beloved song. Rev. Salmon died in 1854, long before William Bradbury composed the music. Rev. Walford, of course, probably never even knew that his poem had been published in a newspaper. God often works through our lives in wonderful ways that we could never imagine. Both Rev. Walford/Rev. Salmon were faithful to share what God had placed on their hearts, and God moved the heart of a composer to provide the melody for these verses.

2. The words of this song speak directly to our condition––the “world of care” in which we live––our “seasons of distress and grief.” But it offers a remedy–– a “sweet hour of prayer.” It holds out hope that we will find relief and escape “the tempter’s snare.”

Sweet Hour of Prayer

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer!
That calls me from a world of care,
And bids me at my Father’s throne
Make all my wants and wishes known.
In seasons of distress and grief,
My soul has often found relief
And oft escaped the tempter’s snare
By thy return, sweet hour of prayer!

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer!
The joys I feel, the bliss I share,
Of those whose anxious spirits burn
With strong desires for thy return!
With such I hasten to the place
Where God my Savior shows His face,
And gladly take my station there,
And wait for thee, sweet hour of prayer!

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer!
Thy wings shall my petition bear
To Him whose truth and faithfulness
Engage the waiting soul to bless.
And since He bids me seek His face,
Believe His Word and trust His grace,
I’ll cast on Him my every care,
And wait for thee, sweet hour of prayer!

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer!
May I thy consolation share,
Till, from Mount Pisgah’s lofty height,
I view my home and take my flight:
This robe of flesh I’ll drop and rise
To seize the everlasting prize;
And shout, while passing through the air,
“Farewell, farewell, sweet hour of prayer!”

In Lord Tennyson’s poem ‘Morte D’Arthur’ there’s a line which reads:

“More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of.”

Nothing is accomplished in the Lord’s work without prayer. It is the very life of it.