George Coles Stebbins

1846-1945. American gospel hymnwriter. Born in East Carlton, New York, he studied music at Rochester, Chicago, and Boston. He was music director at Chicago's First Baptist Church from 1868, and in 1874 took up a similar post at Boston's Clarendon Street Church, and later at Tremont Temple. He was a lifelong acquaintance of D.L. Moody, Ira Sankey, P.P. Bliss, and D.W. Whittle. For nearly fifty years he led choirs, wrote music, and worked as an evangelistic music director. Stebbins produced over 1500 hymns, and was coauthor of several hymnbooks. Of his many popular gospel hymns one of the best known is “Take time to be holy.”