Best viewed in
Internet Explorer

Music (PDF)

Midi

Music (BMW)

Back to


Updated 09/08/2020

Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus

George Duffield, Jr.

George Duffield, Jr. (1818-1888) penned the words to “Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus” in 1858.  Duffield’s fa­ther and grand­fa­ther were Pres­by­ter­i­an min­is­ters. He grad­u­at­ed from Yale Un­i­ver­si­ty in 1837, and from the Un­ion The­o­log­ic­al Sem­in­ary in 1840. Or­dained a Pres­by­ter­i­an min­is­ter like his fa­ther and grand­fa­ther, he first pas­tored at the Fifth Pres­by­ter­i­an Church in Brook­lyn, New York, for se­ven years. He then served at the First Church of Bloom­field, New Jer­sey (1847-52), the Cen­tral Pres­by­ter­i­an Church of the North­ern Lib­er­ties in Phil­a­del­phia, Penn­syl­van­ia (1852-61). There he found a mort­gaged church build­ing in a neigh­bor­hood from which the pop­u­la­tion was mov­ing west­ward, a con­gre­ga­tion re­duced in num­bers, dis­heart­ened, and un­a­ble to meet its fi­nan­cial ob­li­ga­tions. Duf­field held on un­til 1861, when he re­signed his pas­tor­ate. He lat­er served at Adri­an, Mich­i­gan (1861-5); Gales­burg, Ill­i­nois (1865-9); then Sag­i­naw Ci­ty, Mich­i­gan, 1869; and Ann Ar­bor and Lans­ing, Mi­chi­gan (from 1869). Hymn­ol­o­gist Sam­u­el Duf­field was his son.

George Webb

The music is by George James Webb (1803-1887).  Webb be­gan his ca­reer as an or­gan­ist in Fal­mouth, Eng­land. In 1830, he em­i­grat­ed to Bos­ton, Mass­a­chu­setts, where he played the or­gan at the Old South Church for al­most 40 years. He al­so played the or­gan and be­longed to the Bos­ton Church of the New Je­ru­sa­lem. He and Low­ell Ma­son found­ed the Bos­ton Acad­e­my of Mu­sic, as well as col­lab­o­rat­ing on their Mu­sic­al Lib­ra­ry. Webb al­so com­posed sev­er­al chor­al and or­gan works, in­clud­ing “Prel­ude in Eb” and “Post­lude in A.”

‘Stand Up for Jesus’ was the dy­ing mes­sage of the Rev­er­end Dud­ley A. Tyng to the Young Men’s Christ­ian As­so­ci­a­tion…The Sab­bath be­fore his death he preached in the im­mense ed­i­fice known as Jaynes’ Hall, one of the most suc­cess­ful ser­mons of mo­dern times. Of the five thou­sand men there as­sem­bled, at least one thou­sand, it was be­lieved were ‘the slain of the Lord’…The fol­low­ing Wed­nes­day, leav­ing his stu­dy for a mo­ment, he went to the barn floor, where a mule was at work on a horse-pow­er, shell­ing corn. Pat­ting him on the neck, the sleeve of his silk stu­dy gown caught in the cogs of the wheel, and his arm was torn out the roots! His death oc­curred in a few hours…The au­thor of the hymn preached from Eph. 6:14, and the…verses were writ­ten simp­ly as the con­clud­ing ex­hor­ta­tion. The su­per­in­tend­ent of the Sab­bath school had a fly-leaf print­ed for the child­ren—a stray co­py found its way into a Bap­tist news­pa­per, from that pa­per it has gone…all over the world.

Lyrics by George Duffield, Jr.