On A Dark And Stormy Night...

I have many books on my book shelf as I always think I have time to read yet somehow I haven't read most of them. Well, I went to pick out my next latest book and I saw that I had a book called "Amazing Grace" and I decided that sounded good. 

Well, it is actually 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions!! I LOVE this kind of stuff so immediately I was in hog-heaven! I am right now doing daily devotions by Charles Spurgeon whom I dearly love but flipped through this book out of curiosity. Much to my surprise two small pieces of paper with what looked like an older woman's handwriting fell to the floor. I had to read them, didn't I?

 Lorain Harbor Lighthouse

Here is what the pieces of paper read...

On a dark and stormy night, when the waves rolled like mountains and not a star was to be seen, a boat rocking and plunging, neared the Lorain Harbor at Cleveland.  

"Are you sure this is Cleveland?" asked the Captain, seeing only  the light from the lighthouse.  
"Quite sure, Sir." replied the Pilot. 
 "But where are the lower lights?"
"They're out, Sir."
"Can you make it?"
"We must or we'll perish, Sir!"

With a strong hand and a brave heart, the old Pilot turned the wheel; but alas in the darkness he missed the channel, and with a crash upon the rocks, the boat was slivered and many lives were lost in a watery grave."


It was D.L Moody preaching and using as an illustration, this story that had first appeared in the Chicago papers. It was an actual account by the Captain who had been one of the few fortunate enough to escape death.

Behind the tragedy of that night was a story---- by then known to most of those in the audience---- a story of careless negligence not intended to cause a tragedy, yet it did.  Let me tell you as it was relayed by George C. Stebbins, a close friend and associate of both D. L. Moody and P. P. Bliss. 

"It was around the time I had arrived in Chicago, which was 1869, that there appeared in the papers an account of a ship being wrecked on the shored of Lake Erie near Cleveland, Ohio.  The account told of a place called Lorain, which is situated on the lake shore West of Cleveland.  There was built a special harbor for relief of the ships that would most certainly be wrecked if they tried to ride out a storm of the intense and dangerous storms that can hit our large island lakes.  This harbor had a channel running from Lake Erie into a large basin- and inner harbor.  Once ships reached this, they were safe.  At the entrance to this channel were rows of lights which were lit at night and would show ships where to enter.  In the inner harbor there was placed a large lighthouse.  This was to help the ships which were far out.  It seems that on the very day the tragedy happened, the man who had the job of lighting the lower lights and keeping the lighthouse said to himself, "I've been on this job for several years now and to date not one ship has had to find the harbor at night.  I just don't feel up to it today to go out and refill the oil reservoir of the lamps along the shoreline.  I think I'll forget bout them, just for today.  I'll feel better tomorrow and anyway, I just know no one will need those light tonight."

And so when night came, he went to bed--- little dreaming that in a matter of a few short hours his unconcern would cost something he would never forget.  For that very night a turbulent and destructive storm swept across Lake Erie.  Some of the ships were able to ride out the storm, some were not.  But none so tragic as the one that Mr. Moody described in this sermon, which was so close to safety and yet wrecked because of one man's neglect.

Mr. Bliss was in the audience that night and as Mr. Stebbins later told me, Mr. Bliss said to him, "You know George, I had read the newspaper account and I must admit I was shaken byt he fact that one man's negligence could be so costly.  But it was when Mr. Moody used it as an illustration in his message that night I cried out in my heart, "Bliss, you are just as guilty as the man in the story!  As a Christian, you are to be one of the lower lights shinning brightly so that some poor soul tossed about on the sea of life mat find safety and everlasting life in the haven of God has prepared."  Mr. Bliss continued, "George, I couldn't dismiss the thought from my heart neither from my mind.  It so overwhelmed me that the very next week I wrote the song, 'Let the Lower Lights Be Burning'.

In conclusion, Mr. George Stebbins remarked, "Bliss was a very unused man, a very gifted man.  He had a special ability to take a story from life of from the bible and make it live through a song."

 
I didn't realized why Mr. Gibbons had said that Bliss was an unused man until I read the story above the hymn in the book.   The man was Philip P. Bliss and he was born in 1838 and died in 1876- he was 38 years old.  He died in a tragic train accident at Ashtabula, Ohio during the Christmas season.  Many of his songs include "Jesus Loves Even Me"  "Hold the Fort"  "hallelujah, What a Savior"  "Wonderful Words of Life" and many more.

Let the Lower Lights Be Burning

Brightly beams our Father’s mercy from His lighthouse evermore,
But to us He gives the keeping of the lights along the shore.
 

Let the lower lights be burning! Send a gleam across the wave!
For to us He gives the keeping of the lights along the shore.

Some poor struggling, sinking sailor you may rescue, you may save.]
 

Dark the night of sin has settled, loud the angry billows roar;
Eager eyes are watching, longing, for the lights, along the shore.
Let the lower lights be burning! Send a gleam across the wave!
Eager eyes are watching, longing, for the lights, along the shore.

Trim your feeble lamp, my brother, some poor sailor tempest tossed,
Trying now to make the harbor, in the darkness may be lost.
Let the lower lights be burning! Send a gleam across the wave!
Trying now to make the harbor, some poor sailor may be lost.

I hope this inspires you to be the Light to the world that you may rescue someone from the stormy seas of life.  It definitely touched me, and I was very glad that this was placed in this book for me to find.