Ray Palmer

Ray Palmer was an American Congregational minister, poet, translator, and hymn writer. Born in Little Compton, Rhode Island, he spent part of his youth working in a Boston dry-goods store before a religious awakening strengthened his desire for ministry. He studied at Phillips Academy in Andover and graduated from Yale College in 1830, supporting himself in part through teaching. He continued theological study privately and was ordained in 1835.

Palmer served Congregational churches in Bath, Maine, from 1835 to 1850 and Albany, New York, from 1850 to 1865. He later became corresponding secretary of the American Congregational Union, serving until 1878. His published works included Hymns and Sacred Pieces in 1865, Hymns of My Holy Hours in 1868, and a collected edition of his poetry in 1876. He also translated hymns as well as writing original texts.

My Faith Looks Up to Thee was his earliest and most widely circulated hymn. Palmer wrote it in 1830 while teaching in New York, initially as a private devotional poem. His own later account remembered composing it with deep emotion and no expectation that it would become a congregational hymn.