HIMknowledgey Ministry - Revive Us Again

Author Hopes New Book Will Be Used To Help Change Lives
By Elizabeth Einstein

To say that God put a song in this man's heart would be an understatement. In reality, God put hundreds and hundreds of songs in the heart of Douglas Alvin Snow—and each and every song has a different author. "I was always complaining about what was wrong with music in the church. It occurred to me that I should be writing about all that is right," says Snow who is a walking encyclopedia of old hymns and choruses. The more he learned, the more determined he was to do something with all the information he was collecting.

"I specifically remember the day the idea came to me," says Snow, "I spent January 1, 1980, with Dr. Al Smith in Montrose, PA. I thought I wanted to write the Al Smith story, but he redirected me to seven local hymnwriters."

One of the hymnwriters was connected to Practical Bible Training School, and Snow remembers visiting the school the next day where Mrs. Esther Robb handed him a school yearbook dedicated to John R. Clements, one of the great hymnwriters Al Smith believed to be overlooked.

Since Doug doesn't do anything half way, he was soon immersed in the history of hymns and ageless truth. Today his knowledge of hymnody is remarkable and his knowledge concerning Clements' life—and so many other hymnwriters—is amazing. However, while he was gathering all this information, Doug didn't know what he was going to do with it. After all, plenty of people had written books telling the history of hymns—including his friend Al Smith. Doug didn't let that discourage him. He talked about hymn histories to everyone who crossed paths with him—always open to ideas and suggestions. At one time he put together a book of three hundred plus choruses of yesterday, thinking perhaps that was the direction he was to travel.

It was not until the Lord led Snow and his wife, Eileen, to Open Bible Baptist Church in Johnson City, that his ideas began to find momentum. The young pastor at Open Bible, Ben Graham, encouraged Doug to put his ideas together and connected him with a publisher—Blessed Hope Publications in Arkansas.

"God has had so many people in place in this. I didn't even know I was going to write a chronological hymn book," said Snow. "As I was putting everything together, the realization came to me that I had every year, every state, and every president in my outline." Thus, the chronological anthology of American Gospel Hymnody was born and "Revive Us Again" was in the making. Once completed, Blessed Hope was waiting to take the book to the printer in Michigan.

As Doug continued compiling his information, he couldn't help but notice something remarkable about the hymnwriters. "It's about transformed lives—every hymn story has a transformed life story." The greatest of the hymns often came as a result of adversity in the writer and composer's lives. The writers were able to turn darkness and difficulty into song, demonstrating down through the ages, God's faithfulness to all His children.

Because of this, Doug would like his book to reach people "who are going to church for all the wrong reasons." He explains that "Revive Us Again" is more than just a collection of hymn stories—the work and power of the Lord resounds through its pages. There is new understanding, help and encouragement as you read through these hymnwriters' histories.

There are 366 selections in "Revive Us Again," one for each day of the year so that the book can also be used as a devotional. The stories include the most important details of the songs; people, places and time, and pictures are provided of the writers, composers, translators and arrangers. Each selection appears in the chronological order it became available in American hymnbooks with facts that help the reader understand what was going on in the world at that exact time. It covers a time period from 1150 to 1927. A 38-page chronological outline shows the sequence of people and events important to the founding and development of America.

Each of the 366 hymns and stories are numbered and listed in bold print to show where they fit in the history of American hymnody. "Did I ever think D. L. Moody would be included in this book? No. Not only did he not write any songs, he couldn't sing. Yet, D. L. Moody is in eleven hymn stories in the book," says Snow.

Now that the book is finally finished, Doug is off and running with several other ideas including developing the information into lesson plans for high school and college students, producing a video, and establishing a website for the Gospel Hymn Hall of Fame.

There are 5,426 first-edition copies of "Revive Us Again" available. They can be purchased in quantities of one or more. Unloading 5,426 books—each one weighing roughly the same as a good dictionary—is not something Doug Snow wants to do again, but if his new book, "Revive Us Again," is the success it looks to be, he just might find himself unloading case after case of books again—someday soon.