Have Thine Own Way
...as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand... Jeremiah 18:6
Hope differed makes the heart sick, says Proverbs 13:12. Yet disappointments are His appointments." God uses setbacks to renew our focus on Him, to strengthen our faith, and to divert us to other opportunities. In this case, a bitter disappointment led toone of our greatest invitational hymns. Its author, Adelaide Pollard, was born in Iowa during the Civil War. Her parents named her Sarah, but when she was old enough, she changed her name to "Adelaide," not liking the name "Sarah." After attending the Boston school of Oratory (Emerson College), she moved to Chicago to teach in a girls' school. While in Chicago and struggling with frail health, she was attracted to the strange ministry of John Alexander Dowie, a Scottish-born faith healer who was drawing international attention. In 1901, Dowie announced he was the Elijah who would precede the Coming of Christ. Purchasing 6,800 acres of land outside Chicago, he began building "Zion City," which, despite a strong start, ended in failure. Adelaide, however, was apparently healed of diabetes through Dowie's ministry.
Afterward, she became very involved in the work of an evangelist named Sanford, who was predicting the imminent return of Christ. In New England, where she had moved to assist Sanford, she felt God was calling her to Africa as a missionary. But, to her intense disappointment, she was unable to raise her financial support. Heartsick, Adelaide, in her forties at the time, attended a prayer meeting. That night an elderly woman prayed, "It doesn't matter what you bring into our lives, Lord. Just have your own way with us."
That phrase rushed into Adelaide's heart, and the verses began shaping in her mind. At home that evening, she read again the story of the potter and the clay in Jeremiah 18. By bedtime she had written out the prayer, "Have Thine Own Way."
Adelaide did eventually make it to Africa, but the outbreak of World War I sent her to Scotland and, later, back to America where she wrote poems, spoke to groups, and ministered freely.
In the middle of December, 1934, Adelaide, 72 purchased a ticket at New York's Penn Station. She was heading to Pennsylvania for a speaking engagement. While waiting for the train, she was stricken with a seizure and shortly thereafter died.
Excerpt from "Then Sings My Soul" by Robert J. Morgan
Thomas Nelson Publishers
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