Originally Posted by Quilter7x
Originally Posted by adyldrop
i love this song. one of my faves. Also It is well with my soul--the reason why it was written...This hymn was writ*ten af*ter two ma*jor trau*mas in Spaf*ford’s life. The first was the great Chi*ca*go Fire of Oc*to*ber 1871, which ru*ined him fi*nan*cial*ly (he had been a weal*thy bus*i*ness*man). Short*ly af*ter, while cross*ing the At*lan*tic, all four of Spaf*ford’s daugh*ters died in a col*li*sion with an*o*ther ship. Spaf*ford’s wife Anna sur*vived and sent him the now fa*mous tel*e*gram, “Saved alone.” Sev*er*al weeks lat*er, as Spaf*ford’s own ship passed near the spot where his daugh*ters died, the Ho*ly Spir*it in*spired these words. They speak to the eter*nal hope that all be*liev*ers have, no mat*ter what pain and grief be*fall them on earth.
Thank you so much for sharing this. We have sung this hymn at church before and I have it on one of my Christian CD's, but I wasn't aware of how it came to be.
Carrie did a wonderful job on it and I think Vince Gill was a wonderful complement to her both in voice and the instrument he played. I recorded the show and have already watched it again plus I've watched this song on YouTube several times already.
Girls Night Out was a great show this past Friday night! :thumbup:
Actually I did some further investigating. I had heard this part of the story but it starts a lot earlier...Spafford was really more of a modern Job. He was a succesfful lawyer in Chicago. He had 4 children; one son. His son died at an early age. Then, he lost all of his real estate assets in the great Chicago fire. After all the turmoil they decided to go to Europe for vacation. He stayed behind for buisness and sent his wife and daughters ahead. An iron bearing vessel I believe struck their ship and caused 200+ deaths. His wife landed in Europe with the other few survivors and sent her mesage "saved alone. what should i do?" He immediately left to bring his wife back home, passed the site of his daughters' deaths and there was touched by the Spirit to write "It is Well". What a story of maintaining your faith and praise through it all....