Some people are handed a storm in the very first weeks of life. Fanny Crosby was one of them. She lost her sight as a baby, grew up in a world with very few opportunities for blind children, and still became one of the most beloved songwriters in history. Her story is proof that what looks like a limit can become a calling.

A storm from the very beginning

Frances Jane Crosby was born on March 24, 1820, in Brewster, New York. When she was about six weeks old, she developed an eye inflammation. She later said the treatment she received damaged her eyes, though modern doctors think her blindness may have been present from birth. By the time she was five, a well-known surgeon told her family her blindness was permanent.

Many people would have expected a quiet, limited life for her. Fanny had other plans. At just eight years old, she wrote her first poem, a cheerful verse about choosing to be content even though she could not see.

Learning, teaching and speaking to Congress

In 1835, just before turning 15, Fanny enrolled at the New York Institution for the Blind. She learned piano, organ, harp and guitar, and became a gifted singer. After graduating, she stayed on to teach grammar, rhetoric and history.

In 1846, she spoke before a joint session of the United States Congress, arguing for education for blind people. A blind young woman, standing before the nation's leaders, asking them to open doors for people like her. That took courage.

A river of songs

Fanny went on to write more than 8,000 hymns and gospel songs. She wrote so many that publishers worried about printing too many songs by one person, so she used nearly 200 different pen names. Some of her songs are still sung in churches all over the world today, including:

• "Blessed Assurance" (words written in 1873, music by Phoebe Knapp)
• "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour" (1868)
• "To God Be the Glory"
• "All the Way My Savior Leads Me"
• "Safe in the Arms of Jesus"

"Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine! O what a foretaste of glory divine!" (Fanny Crosby, 1873)

She saw her blindness differently

Fanny never described her life as a tragedy. She said her blindness "seemed intended by the blessed providence of God," and she thanked God for it. And she looked forward to one beautiful promise: that when she reached heaven, "the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior."

She died on February 12, 1915, at the age of 94, in Bridgeport, Connecticut. More than a hundred years later, her songs are still lifting people through their own storms.

What Fanny teaches us

• Your limits are not your ending. What you can't do doesn't cancel what you can.
• Gratitude changes the story. Fanny chose to see her life as a gift, and it became one to millions.
• Use your voice for others. She didn't just succeed. She fought so others could have the same chance.

Is there a hymn or song that carried you through a hard time? Share it in the comments.

Source: Wikipedia, "Fanny Crosby."