Helen Lemmel, Mabel Hamilton's advocate (see Hymn Writer Helps Provide Passage to Africa), was already a well-known Christian singer when a friend handed her a tract. The words she read struck a chord: “So then, turn your eyes upon Him, look full into His face and you will find that the things of earth will acquire a strange new dimness.”

It was as if she was commanded to stop and listen, Mrs. Lemmel later wrote. A chorus began to weave through her spirit and soul, without a conscious moment of putting word to word to make rhyme, or note to note to make melody. The song became the well-known hymn, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.

O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s a light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free!

Refrain:
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.

Through death into life everlasting
He passed, and we follow Him there;
Over us sin no more hath dominion—
For more than conquerors we are!

His Word shall not fail you—He promised;
Believe Him, and all will be well:
Then go to a world that is dying,
His perfect salvation to tell!

Do those words strike a chord with you? Are your weary and troubled, with no light shining in the darkness? Perhaps now is the moment to turn your eyes upon Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, the giver of light and life. He endured death on the cross so that we might have a life more abundant and free.

By turning your eyes upon Jesus, you confess your sins and ask God to take control of your life. It’s a simple process and begins with words like this:

God, I want to look full in Your face. I’m sinful and separated from You. I know salvation comes through your son, Jesus Christ. I accept Him today and commit to following Him forever.

If you have prayed this prayer, or would like to know more, please contact the church from which you received this paper or send us a note at FGBC World.
 

Events of general interest among Grace Brethren Churches. Details and registration information are available from the sponsoring organizations or at www.fgbc.org.

May 5 – Commencement (GC&S)
May 11 – 412 Classes end, internships begin (CE)
May 14-16 – Northwest Focus Retreat, Camp Clear Lake, WA (FGBC) corrected date
June 11-15 -- ACTS training (GBIM)
June 12 – Operation Barnabas begins, Lititz, PA (CE)
June 21-24 – DRIVEN07, Kenyon College, Gambier, OH (CE)
June 23 – Alumni Basketball Game in the new Orthopaedic Capital Center (GC&S)
June 24-July 22 – MasterWorks Festival (GC&S)
June 30 – July 1 – Alumni Creation Celebration Tour (GC&S)
July 10-14 – GBIM Missionary Family Reunion
July 21-27 – Momentum (BNYC) 2007, University of Southern Mississippi (CE)
July 29 – Orthopaedic Capital Center Dedication at Equip07 (GC&S)
July 29-August 3, 2007 – Equip07, Winona Lake, IN (FGBC)
Aug. 21 – Fall Semester Begins (GC&S)
Sept. 16 -- Mid Atlantic Celebration, Calvary GBC, Hagerstown, MD (CE) Sept. 17 -- Northern Atlantic Celebration, Good ‘n Plenty Restaurant, Smoketown, PA (CE)

GBNAM = Grace Brethren North American Missions
GBIM = Grace Brethren International Missions
CE = CE National
FGBC = Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches
GC&S = Grace College and Seminary

A look back at the months of May and June in the Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches.

Twenty Years Ago – 1987
- Newly-appointed missionaries with Grace Brethren Foreign Missions included Dave and Sue Guiles and Steve and Wilma Bailey, Argentina; Tom and Sue Peters, Central African Republic (CAR); Paul and Louise Klawitter and Mark and Joy Sims, France.
- David Manges was ordained to the ministry at the Chambersburg, Pa., Grace Brethren Church.

Thirty Years Ago – 1977
- Bob Divine was ordained to the ministry at the Ireland Road Grace Brethren Church in South Bend, Ind.
- Grace College graduates: Elizabeth Cutler, Jonathon Hall, Jim Hocking, Kathy Manduka, and Viki (Cover) Rife. Grace Theological Seminary grads: Carl Baker, Larry Edwards, Dave Mitchell, Pierre Yougouda (CAR), Gary Austin, and Paulette Sauders. James Custer received a Th.M. degree.

Thirty-Five Years Ago - 1972
- Michael (Mick) Rockafellow accepted call to pastor Flora, Ind., Grace Brethren Church following graduation from Grace Theological Seminary. Galen Lingenfelter began as pastor of Ft. Wayne, Ind. Grace Brethren Church.
- A new congregation was organized as the Hope Grace Brethren Church in Dillsburg, Pa., Kenneth Wilt, pastor.
- The Waynesboro, Pa. Grace Brethren Church dedicated its new sanctuary on April 30. Wendell Kent, pastor.
- Grace College graduates included: Tad Hobert, Judy Herman, Tim Waggoner, Dan White, Joan Lesh, and Wayne Hannah. Seminary grads: Michael Rockafellow, John Teevan, and Ron Weimer.

Forty Years Ago – 1967
- The New Scofield Reference Bible was presented on April 13. Honored as one of the revision committee was Dr. Alva J. McClain, founder and president of Grace Theological Seminary.
- The Northern Ohio District was divided into the Northeastern Ohio (13 churches) and the Northcentral Ohio (14 churches) districts.
- Jesse Deloe resigned as pastor at the Lyndhurst Grace Brethren Church (Ohio) to assume the pastorate of the North Riverdale Brethren Church, Dayton, Ohio.
- Grace College graduates: Bill and Joan (Herr) Darr, Mike Grill, Bernie Simmons, Charlotte Poyner. From the Seminary: Tim Farner, Don Farner, and Bob Moeller. John Davis received a Th.D. degree.

Forty-Five Years Ago – 1962
- Herman A. Hoyt was selected as the second president of Grace Schools, succeeding Alva J. McClain. Hoyt, along with McClain, was one of the founders of Grace Theological Seminary.
- Succeeding Hoyt as deans of the seminary and college were Homer Kent, Jr. and E. William Male, respectively.
- Bob Griffith became pastor of the First Brethren Church of Philadelphia on June 24.
- Among the Grace Seminary graduates, Class of 1962: John Davis, Ed Mensinger, Ron Henry, Ken Koontz, Jim Nesbitt, Randy Poyner, and Mike Volovski.
- James Custer, a Grace Seminary middler, was called as summer associate pastor at Wooster, Ohio, where Kenneth Ashman was pastor.

Fifty-five Years Ago - 1952
- Among the Grace Seminary graduates in the class of 1952 were: Ralph Burns, John Dilling, Martin Garber, Lester Kennedy, Gail Jones, Bill Smith, and Lynn Schrock. Homer Kent, Jr. received a Th.M. degree, while Robert Culver received a Th.D. degree.
- On April 30, the Whittier (Calif.) Community Grace Brethren Church was dedicated. Wayne Flory, pastor.
- Evangelist Bill Smith was ordained to the ministry in the Washington, D.C. church on June 22.
- Ralph Burns, freshly graduated from Grace Seminary, became pastor of the Clay City, Ind., Brethren Church.

Sixty Years Ago - 1947
- Homer A. Kent, Jr. was awarded the Scholarship Medal at Bob Jones College for the second time, acknowledging the highest grade average.
- Lester Pifer a 1947 graduate of Grace Theological Seminary, was ordained to the ministry at the Fremont, Ohio, Grace Brethren Church.
- On March 20, the West Kittanning, Pa. Grace Brethren Church was dedicated. Arthur Malles, pastor.

Sixty-five Years Ago – 1942
- Florence Gribble, a pioneer missionary to French Equatorial Africa (now the Central African Republic), died.

Joel Richards, Modesto, Calif.; Dan White, York, Pa.; and Bud Olszewski, Rittman, Ohio, have been elected to three year terms as president, secretary, and treasurer, respectively, of the Association of Grace Brethren Ministers (AGBM).

Elected to the AGBM board of directors for three-year terms (2007-09) are Ken Bickel, Goshen, Ind.; Mark Saunders, Englewood, Ohio; Randall Smith, Sebring, Fla.; and Randy Weekley, Pinellas Park, Fla. Elected to two-year terms (2007-08) are Doug Courter, Clear Spring, Md.; Robert Fetterhoff, Wooster, Ohio; and Robert Soto, McAllen, Tx. Serving one year terms (2007) are Terry Daniels, South Pasadena, Calif.; Greg Howell, Goldendale, Wash.; and Ralph Molyneaux, Crestview, Fla.

This is the first time since the association’s founding in 1894 that members all over the world have been empowered to elect offices. Previously, members were required to be physically present at the annual meeting in order to cast ballots.

In addition, this is the first that a board has been chosen to direct the work of the association. Officers have been elected on a regular basis, but they were never supported by a board who empowered them to make decisions on behalf of the organization.

The board will meet once a year prior to national conference. The rest of the year, they will discuss issues at virtual meetings, using Internet technology. For more information, log onto www.agbm.org.

 

Mabel Crawford Hamilton is perhaps best known in the Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches as the head librarian at Grace College and Seminary. She and her husband, Ben, served in the library for 25 years, including overseeing the move of the library from the west wing of McClain Hall to the new Morgan Library building in 1969. However she was also an early Brethren missionary to the Central African Republic (then French Equatorial Africa), serving 20 years, beginning in 1932 and later after her 1943 marriage to Ben.

 

In her memoirs, penned before her death in 2000, Mabel wrote about the “miracle tickets” that provided passage to Africa for Ben and her following World War II.

Mabel, whose family home was in Whittier, Calif., took her new husband to meet Helen Lemmel, who attended the Grace Brethren Church in Pasadena, Calif. Helen had performed professionally and had authored hundreds of hymns, including the well-known Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus. “She had a beautiful voice,” recalled Mabel.

“When I came home from Africa during World War II, I met Helen Lemmel for the first time. … she was attending a southern California Brethren women’s missionary rally with two or three hundred women in attendance. … Every time we were together in one of these meetings someone would be sure to ask Helen Lemmel to sing the entire song that she had written …, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus. Nobody could sing that song like Helen. And though I have heard it sung many times and have sung it myself many times, I can still close my eyes and hear Helen herself.”

 

During the course of the Hamilton’s visit, Helen inquired about how soon the couple would be able to travel to Africa.

 

“During the war hundreds of missionaries from around the world had come home to America and after the war was over, they all wanted to get back to their mission points,” Mabel remembered. “The steamship lines were trying to deal with hundreds of people clamoring to get back to Africa, to China, to various places. American freight boats were at a premium in those days because so many of them had been sunk during the war. Freight boats carried freight, primarily, but usually they had cabins that would accommodate anywhere from eight to twelve passengers, rarely more than that. So hundreds of missionaries were lined up to get the few openings on these various freight boats that plowed the oceans.

“As I was talking with Mrs. Lemmel that afternoon and she wanted to know how soon we would be able to go to the field, I said, ‘I have no idea. When we go to talk to the steamship company, we’re up against a closed door. There are so many people ahead, and we have no way of breaking through that barrier.’”

Mabel wrote that Helen did not say a word, “She simply got up from her chair, walked across the room, picked up her telephone and called New York.”

It turned out that her son-in law was the president of a steamship line in New York City. She called him directly and said something like this: I have a couple of friends here, Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton. They’re missionaries to Africa and they need a boat to get to Africa. Now I want you to do what you can do to get them passage on one of your ships sailing for Africa.

 

Within one month, the couple received notification from the steamship line that they had passage. “We only had a few weeks to get ready, to get from California to New York,” she recalled.

 

Mabel also remembered that Ruth Kent was waiting to go to Africa for the first time to teach the missionary children. “She immediately packed and went to New York with us,” Mabel recalled. “They said there was no passage for her. Every day she would walk down to the boat… She would go to the steamship office and I think out of sheer anxiety to get rid of her, they found a place for her on the boat.”

It was a memorable voyage. “She (Ruth) was able to go to Africa with us,” wrote Mabel. “That was quite a trip, as I took those two new, green missionaries, Ruth and Ben, across the ocean to the mouth of the Congo River and up the Congo River and into French Equatorial Africa.”

Mabel would later recall how God used Helen Lemmel in their lives as missionaries. “The Lord had been so good to us,” she wrote of their arrival in Africa. “He had given us a very safe, a very easy trip back to Africa …”

All because of a friendship with a hymn writer in California.

See related story, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.