What is the best-known Christian song in the world? What Christian song has
been translated into more languages than any other song? The answer may
surprise you. You know the song well. In fact, it’s probably one of the
first songs you ever learned.
Back in the mid 19th century, two unmarried sisters, Anna and Susan Warner,
lived across the Hudson River from West Point. After the death of their
father, who had been a New York attorney impoverished by the depression of
1837, they supported themselves by writing. Susan wrote novels which became
best-sellers. Anna wrote poems and hymns and, in fact, wrote a new hymn each
month for a Sunday School class she taught made up of West Point cadets.
One day in 1860, Susan was writing a story about an ill child and wanted to
include a song that could be sung to the dying youth. She turned for help to
her songwriter sister. That’s when Anna penned these memorable words:
Jesus loves me! This I know
For the Bible tells me so
Little ones to Him belong
They are weak, but He is strong.
That is the song that has become the best-known Christian song in the world.
Anna later published it separately in a hymnbook. And the tune we use today
was composed in 1862 by William Bradbury. He is the one who, in fact, added
the refrain:
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
The Bible tells me so.
Is there any more basic