Level: Late Intermediate

Format: PDF Digital Download

License: Studio (please share with your students only)

Although our church congregation sings this hymn regularly, I had to think twice before creating this arrangement. "Take my anything" is a bold and brave statement of submission. The second verse begins "take my hands" which is particularly hard to swallow as our son experienced the horror of losing a hand.

Frances Ridley Havergal, the author of the text, follows "take my life" with "let it be" and not "let it go." Realizing the difference between let it go and let it be was comforting despite permanent loss. I didn't have to let go and make myself stop feeling a certain way. Instead, it gave me the option to let the feeling be what it is, acknowledge it, experience it, and eventually grow with it.

The arrangement features four variations of the tune.

• Supplication

• Adoration

• Lamentation

• Restoration

As you play or "sing" the four verses, I encourage you to reflect on the spirit of each variation and ask yourself:

• What was taken that I can let be?

• How can loss turn into “ceaseless praise ever only all for Thee?”