Cleland Boyd McAfee

Cleland Boyd McAfee was born in Ashley, Missouri, on September 25, 1866. His father, John Armstrong McAfee, founded Park College in Parkville, Missouri, and served as its first president. Cleland graduated from Park College in 1884, studied at Union Theological Seminary in New York, and returned to Park as a faculty member, pastor, and choir director. In 1901 he became pastor of Forty-First Street Presbyterian Church in Chicago. He later led Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn from 1904 to 1912, encouraging its strong music and mission programs.

McAfee combined pastoral ministry with scholarship. He held the chair of systematic theology at McCormick Theological Seminary from 1912 to 1930, served as moderator of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. General Assembly in 1929, and then became secretary of the denomination’s Board of Foreign Missions. His books included The Greatest English Classic, a study of the King James Bible and its literary influence.

In 1903 McAfee wrote both the words and music of this hymn in response to the deaths of two young daughters of his brother Howard during a diphtheria outbreak. A family account later published by his daughter Katharine McAfee Parker preserves the story of its first singing. Although McAfee’s career encompassed teaching, preaching, administration, and authorship, this paired text and tune became his principal contribution to congregational song. He died in Asheville, North Carolina, on February 4, 1944.