And God will raise you up on eagle’s wings

And God will raise you up on eagle’s wings. Jan Michael Joncas* (1951- ). According to the Handbook to the Baptist Hymnal [1991], this was written in 1978, when Joncas was visiting a friend. The friend received a telephone call to say that his father had had a heart attack, from which he died. Joncas sang this song to guitar accompaniment at the service before the funeral Eucharist. It began ‘And he will raise you up...’. It was published in Glory and Praise (Phoenix, Arizona, 1979), and has become widely adopted in subsequent hymnals, sometimes with the first line ‘And I will raise you up’. It is used in some books (such as the Canadian VU, and the Baptist Hymnal) as a powerful refrain for...