John Bauman was a Lutheran pastor in Prague, Bohemia, who because of religious persecution escaped to England.
In England he was known as John Bowerman and held the mastership of a grammar school at Kingston upon Thames, now a suburb of London.
John died and left his daughter, Monica, an orphan.
John Doddridge (1621-1689) was rector of Shepperton, Middlesex. Resigning his living after the Act of Uniformity of 1662, requiring all Church of England congregations to follow a prescribed form of worship, he became a non-conformist minister. One of John’s children was Daniel Doddridge ( - 1715), a dealer in oils and pickles. Monica and Daniel married and had nineteen children, but only one of those survived to adulthood. The twentieth and last born to the union was so frail at birth that the doctor set aside, thinking he was dead. But as he lay there, he began to cry. Being saved, his mother named him Philip and dedicated him to the Lord. Before he could read, Monica taught Philip stories from the Bible by using the Dutch picture tiles on the chimney place of their sitting room. He was first educated by a tutor employed by his parents and at the age of 10 attended the same grammar school where his grandfather had once served in Kingston upon Thames.
Philip’s mother died when he was eight and his father died four years later leaving him destitute.
Though he longed to be a minister, there seemed no way to afford the necessary education.
Friends advised him to prepare for another profession, hopefully one with an apprenticeship.
Before he made his final decision, he set aside a day for earnest prayer. While he was praying, the postman arrived with a letter from a
wealthy benefactor offering to finance his training.
It was such a timely answer that Philip resolved to live a life of prayer and could be found afterward praying anywhere at anytime.
His new guardian, named Downes, moved him to another private school at St. Albans where he was influenced by the Presbyterian teaching taught there.
The Duchess of Bedford became interested in him and offered to send him to either Oxford or Cambridge University,
provided he became a clergyman for the Church of England.
His family leanings toward the Independent or Congregationalist lead him to refuse the offer.
He preached his first sermon at the age of twenty from 1 Corinthians 16:22 [If anyone does not love the Lord –a curse be on him. Come, O Lord!] Two people accepted Christ because of his sermon that day. He married Mercy Maris during the holiday season of 1730. and they had five children. Their first, Tetsey, died just before her fifth birthday and was buried under the altar at Doddridge Chapel. The other four survived to adulthood.
Philip enrolled in the non-conformist academy at Kibworth and in 1729, at the age of 27, became the minister at the
Northampton Congregationalist Church and head of the Dissenting (non-Anglican) academy for ministerial students in Northampton.
He would work with this congregation and academy for the next twenty-two years.
While there, he taught Hebrew, Greek, philosophy, logic, algebra, trigonometry and theology.
As many as 200 students came each year from all over England, Scotland and the Netherlands to set at his feet.
In 1736, both the universities in Aberdeen awarded him the degree of Doctor of Divinity.
Doddridge, as did many preachers during his day, wrote poetry to summarize and conclude their sermons. During his lifetime he wrote some 370 – 400 plus hymn poems, which were published posthumously by his friend Job Orton in 1755, four years after his death. In Hymns, Founded on Various Texts in the Holy Scriptures, Orton arranged the hymns as they related to and expressed Scripture texts from Genesis to Revelation. While Doddridge wrote in the style of his very good friend, Isaac Watts, he did not possess Watt’s poetic skill, but his ability to reflect the social message of the gospel was greater than Watts and revealed the first missionary zeal in hymnic writing, anticipating by more than 50 years the coming missionary movement. His famous prose works included his commentary on the New Testament, The Family Expositor and Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul. The latter Charles Spurgeon referred to as “that holy book.” William Wilberforce, the great anti-slave trade campaigner, became a Christian after reading the book.
Toward the end of 1750, Philip caught a cold while going to preach a funeral sermon. His condition quickly deteriorated and it
became apparent that consumption (tuberculosis) had set in on Philip’s already frail body.
He preached his final sermon in Northampton from Romans 14:8 [If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord.
So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.]
A clergyman friend from the Church of England collected money to provide a therapeutic holiday for him in Lisbon, Portugal.
He died after arriving in Lisbon and is buried in a cemetery attached to the British Factory in Lisbon where his grave and tomb may still be seen.
The Congregationalist Church building where Doddridge labored survives as the Castle Hill United Reformed Church. The church was founded in 1662, the building errected in 1695 in part from stones taken from an old nearby Roman fort. It was enlarged in 1842.
Of the many hymn poems he wrote, the following are most popular today:
O God of Bethel – 1737
Grace Tis a Charming Sound – 1740
Awake My Soul Stretch Every Nerve – 1751
O Happy Day - 1755
O Happy Day owes it wide popularity today to the tune Edward Rimbault decided to use with his arrangement of the song. Rimbault probably did not write the music for the song, but used a tune from McDonalds’s Wesleyan Sacred Harp book, but Rimbault did add the chorus to the stanzas written by Doddridge. The combination became an instant hit at revivals and camp meetings in America in the nineteenth century. It received new fame when the Walter Hawkins Singers recorded their gospel style arrangement of the song in 1969. It has been used in movies and is a favorite song after baptisms, for which it is well suited. I am sure that neither Doddridge nor Rimbault could have imagined their song sounded like these gospel versions.
Other renditions:
Harlem Gospel Choir (a'cappella)
Wayne Pascall (a'cappella)
from Sister Act2
Soweto Gospel Choir
Happy Voices
Awake, My Soul, Stretch Every Nerve is another fine song, especially since it was paired with the tune we commonly associate with While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks. This was done by Lowell Mason in about 1815. As with the case of so many songs from the British authors, they never heard their words sung to the tunes we use today. Many never saw any royalty from what they wrote and this is especially true about the lyrics of Doddridge, which were published after his death.
References:
A Song is Born / Robert Taylor / 2004 / Taylor Publications
A Treasury of Hymn Stories / Amos Wells / 1945 / Baker Book House
Hymns of Our Faith / William Reynolds / 1967 / Broadman Press
A Literary & Hymn Pilgrimage - Dr. Jerry Rushford / 2011
Then Sings My Soul #1 / Robert J. Morgan / 2003 / Nelson
Then Sings My Soul #3 / Robert J. Morgan / 2011 / Nelson
Wikipedia / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Doddridge