Thomas Caryl Micklem was born August 1, 1925, at Oxford, England, the son of the Mansfield College chaplain. Educated at Mill Hill School and New College, Oxford, he graduated with a B.A. in 1948, and became a member of Mansfield College. He was ordained to the Congregational ministry the next year at Oundle, Northamptonshire, and served for a time as pastor at Banstead, Surrey. A distinguished minister-musician, he edited the music for The Golden Book of Nursery Rhymes, 1951, and contributed eight texts and 14 tunes to New Church Praise, 1975, a hymnal supplement for The United Reformed Church in England (a 1972 merger of the Presbyterian and Congregational churches).

In this simple little “Thank You” hymn, Micklem is not afraid to experiment with conventional materials. Notice that this music is in sparse music sing. The three-part harmony, yet there is no feeling that anything is rhythm goes along freely with the text, sometimes three quarter notes in a bar, sometimes two-which is why the time signature is omitted. (This policy was followed throughout SDAH, that is, if several kinds of meter were used in the hymn, the committee thought it better to allow the note values to dictate the movement, and not have a metrical signature.)

📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.