Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus

Stand Up, Stand up for Jesus

Episcopal Reverend Dudley Tyng was forced to resign from his pastorate in Philadelphia for preaching forcefully against slavery.  Undaunted, he became a Presbyterian and planted a church in his home town.  In addition to his church plant Dudley, along with other ministers, preached at the local YMCA to young men and were used by God to spark a revival of thousands in the city.

In March of 1858, the thirty-three-year-old Tyng preached a sermon to about 5,000 young men in the YMCA hall where over a thousand made professions of faith.  During his sermon he remarked, “I would rather that [my] right arm were amputated at the trunk than that I should come short of my duty to you in delivering God’s message.”

That week, Reverend Tyng went to visit a local farm where he saw a mule-powered corn-shelling machine.  As he reached out to pat one of the mules, the sleeve of his coat caught in the gears and his arm was quickly pulled in to the machine.  The injury was severe and his arm was amputated.

Infection set in and it soon became clear that Dudley was going to die.  His friend and fellow preacher Pastor George Duffield was at his bedside and asked him if he had any message for the men in the city.  “Tell them to stand up for Jesus,” he replied.

Duffield preached the funeral sermon for his friend Dudley Tyng.  He used as his text Ephesians 6:14, “Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness.”  He closed his sermon by having a hymn he wrote sung, a hymn based on his friend’s final words to him:

Stand up, stand up for Jesus, Ye soldiers of the cross;

Lift high His royal banner, It must not suffer loss:

From victory unto victory His army shall He lead,

Till every foe is vanquished, And Christ is Lord indeed.

Stand up, stand up for Jesus, The trumpet call obey;

Forth to the mighty conflict, In this His glorious day:

Ye who are men, now serve Him Against unnumbered foes;

Let courage rise with danger, And strength to strength oppose.

[note the allusion to Dudley Tyng’s injury]

Stand up, stand up for Jesus, Stand in His strength alone;

The arm of flesh will fail you, Ye dare not trust your own:

Put on the gospel armor, Each piece put on with prayer;

Where duty calls, or danger, Be never wanting there.

Stand up, stand up for Jesus, The strife will not be long;

This day the noise of battle, The next, the victor’s song:

To him who overcometh A crown of life shall be;

He, with the King of glory, Shall reign eternally.

[the fifth stanza, omitted from most hymnals today, allude to Tyng’s death in the third line]

Stand up, stand up for Jesus, Each soldier to his post;

Close up the broken column, And shout through all the host:

Make good the loss so heavy, In those that still remain,

And prove to all around you That death itself is gain!

https://wordwisebiblestudies.com/the-strange-case-of-dudley-tyng-stand-up-stand-up-for-jesus/

https://www.hymncharts.com/2015/07/27/the-unusual-story-behind-stand-up-stand-up-for-jesus/

https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/resources/history-of-hymns-stand-up-stand-up-for-jesus