John Ernest Bode

John Ernest Bode was an English Anglican priest, scholar, poet, and hymn writer born in St. Pancras, London, on February 23, 1816. He was educated at Eton, Charterhouse, and Christ Church, Oxford, taking his B.A. in 1837 and M.A. in 1840. He became a Fellow of Christ Church, was ordained deacon in 1841 and priest in 1843, and served as rector of Westwell, Oxfordshire, from 1847 before moving to Castle Camps, Cambridgeshire, in 1860.

Bode’s academic career included the prestigious Bampton Lectures at Oxford in 1855. In 1857 he stood for the Oxford Professorship of Poetry and lost to Matthew Arnold by a very narrow margin. His publications included “Ballads from Herodotus,” “Short Occasional Poems,” and “Hymns from the Gospel of the Day for Each Sunday and Festivals of Our Lord” in 1860.

In 1866 Bode wrote “O Jesus, I Have Promised” for the confirmation of his daughter and two sons. The hymn’s combination of personal promise, awareness of temptation, dependence on Christ, and hope of final fellowship made it closely associated with confirmation while also allowing it to move easily into broader worship centered on discipleship and commitment.