There are tremendous hymns of faith and trust that are born out of tragedy.  Here is an excerpt of one such hymn.

Two years after the devastation of the Great Chicago Fire the Spafford family planned a trip to Europe. Late business demands (zoning issues arising from the Fire) kept Spafford from joining his wife and four daughters on a family vacation in England where his friend D. L. Moody would be preaching.

On November 22, 1873, while crossing the Atlantic on the steamship Ville du Havre, the ship was struck by an iron sailing vessel killing 226 people, including all of Spafford’s daughters. His wife, Anna, survived the tragedy. Upon arriving in    England, she sent a telegram to Spafford that read “Saved alone.” As Spafford sailed to England to join his wife, he wrote “It Is Well with My Soul.”

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,

When sorrows like sea billows roll;

Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,

My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought!

My sin, not in part but the whole,

Is nailed to His cross, and I bear it no more,

And Lord haste the day, when the faith shall be sight,

The clouds be rolled back as a scroll;

The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend,

It is well (it is well),

with my soul (with my soul),

It is well, it is well with my soul.

– Horatio Spafford