He Keeps Me Singing

The Rev. Luther B. Bridgers (1884–1948) had his formative experiences as a young preacher under the guidance of his father, the minister James B. Bridgers (1856–1913). An obituary says he had committed himself to the ministry at age 17.[1] As early as 1906, at age 22, he was drawing attention as a revival preacher. A news release of 18 November 1906 described his involvement in a revival in Wallace, North Carolina:

Big revival in progress at . . . the Methodist Church, of which Rev. W. Franks Sandford is pastor. Evangelist Luther B. Bridgers, of Marion, S.C., is doing the preaching. He is bold and fearless in his denunciation of sin, clear and logical in arguments. The altars have been crowded with men and women seeking the power of higher spiritual life and the spiritual pulse of the people has been greatly quickened. A number of conversions have been reported.[2]

A similarly enthusiastic report appeared in the Raleigh Christian Advocate, 27 February 1908, describing his singing ability:

Rev. Luther Bridgers, the young evangelist who conducted the revival at the Methodist church here last September is now holding some very successful meetings in Southern Florida. He expects to return to North Carolina early in the summer to fill engagements here. Mr. Bridgers is only twenty-three years old, but his success as an evangelist is remarkable. His singing is excellent and is one of the attractive features of his meeting.[3]

Around this same time, Bridgers had enrolled in classes at Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky, where he met Sallie Veatch. They married around 1905 and had three children, Luther Hughes (25 Oct. 1906), Allen Veatch (2 Oct. 1908), and James Marvin (5 Aug. 1910). Bridgers’ musical aspirations included composition. Eight of his songs were published in Charlie Tillman’s The Revival No. 6 (Atlanta: Tillman, 1910), the most enduring of which has been “He Keeps Me Singing” (“There’s within my heart a melody”), originally published with five stanzas and a refrain.

The song has some notable lines relating to hardship, especially the second stanza, and picked up again in the fourth:

All my life was wrecked by sin and strife,
Discord filled my heart with pain;
Jesus swept across the broken strings,
Stirred the slumb’ring chords again.

Tho’ sometimes He leads thro’ waters deep,
Trials fall across the way;
Tho’ sometimes the path seems rough and steep,
See his footprints all the way.

His motivation behind these words is unclear, whether he was speaking from personal experience or channeling his pastoral experience in counseling others. Nevertheless, these words would be prophetic in his life, as tragedy struck his family the following year.

In March of 1911, Bridgers had taken his wife and children to stay with her parents near Harrodsburg, Kentucky, while he went to preach a series of revival meetings in Louisville and Middlesboro. One official news report relayed the details of the subsequent tragedy:

Harrodsburg, Ky., March 27—The residence of J.T. Veach, three miles from town on the Louisville pike, was destroyed by fire shortly after midnight this morning and his daughter, Mrs. Luther Bridgers, and three small children, Hughes, aged 5 years, Veach, aged 3 years, and an infant, were burned to death. The Rev. Luther B. Bridgers, husband and father of the victims, was in Middlesboro when the disaster occurred. He reached here this afternoon. The funeral of the four unfortunates will be held from the home of J.B. Mitchell and burial will be at Wilmore.

It is not known how the fire originated, and the first persons to discover the blaze were the crew of a Southern passenger train. The engineer blew the whistle for some time and Mr. Veach heard the prolonged whistling about the time he discovered the fire. He at once ran through the house, awakening the family. Several of the younger daughters, who were sleeping upstairs, came to a window and descended a ladder.

Mrs. Bridgers and her two oldest children, who were sleeping in another room upstairs, came to the window and a ladder was hurriedly taken to the window, but before the men could get them they had gone back in the room and were not seen again. The remainder of the family escaped in their night clothes.[4]

In spite of this incredible loss, Bridgers would be able to say “Jesus swept across the broken strings, stirred the slumb’ring chords again.” He remarried a few years later to Aline Winburn of Gainesville, Georgia, and had another son, Luther Jr. (19 Dec. 1915). His ministry regained its stride, and he was again recognized as a captivating revivalist, as evidenced by this announcement in the Morristown, Tennessee Gazette, 12 May 1915:

Rev. Luther Bridgers, the well known evangelist, is conducting the meeting and is having excellent results. Rev. Mr. Bridgers is a forceful and plain spoken preacher and his sermons carry with them a message that is convincing to the congregation. There have been a number of conversions thus far and it is expected that before the meetings close a great deal of good will have been accomplished. Large crowds have been attending. On last Sunday night, fully one thousand persons were present and the interest is growing daily. . . .

A feature of the meetings is the excellent singing. Rev. Mr. Bridgers himself possesses a fine voice and sings at each service, while W.B. Corder, an evangelical singer, is assisting the preacher and a large choir composed of singers from the different churches is also taking part.[5]

Bridgers’ song “He Keeps Me Singing” has long been associated with the story of the fire, perhaps through his own testimony in sharing how he was able to keep singing in spite of his loss. In this way, Bridgers’ experience is much like the testimony of the prophet Habakkuk (3:17–18):

Though the fig tree should not blossom,
    nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
    and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
    and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord;
    I will take joy in the God of my salvation (ESV).

by CHRIS FENNER
for Hymnology Archive
28 September 2020

Footnotes:

1. “Luther Bridgers Funeral Today, Pioneer Pastor,” The Atlanta Constitution (29 May 1948), p. 3: PDF

2. “Great meeting at Wallace,” The Morning Star (Wilmington, NC: 18 Nov. 1906), p. 6: PDF

3. “Methodist Mention,” Raleigh Christian Advocate (27 Feb. 1908), p. 8: PDF

4. “Four burn to death near Harrodsburg,” The Courier-Journal (Louisville, KY: 28 March 1911), p. 1: PDF; the official death certificates and gravestone say 26 March 1911, whereas news stories describe the fire happening after midnight, in the early hours of 27 March 1911.

5. “Great Revival,” The Morristown Gazette (Morristown, TN: 12 May 1915), p. 2: PDF

Related Resources:

Ernest K. Emurian, “He Keeps Me Singing,” Great Hymns of Testimony (Nashville: Convention Press, 1976), pp. 38–42.

“There’s within my heart a melody,” Hymnary.org: https://hymnary.org/text/theres_within_my_heart_a_melody