A. J. Sims

Albert Jackson Sims (1884–1969)
Albert Jackson Sims was born in 1884 and died on October 6, 1969. He was a respected Elder in the Primitive Baptist Church in northwest Georgia. Licensed to preach by the Euharlee Association in 1925, he devoted his life to serving many Primitive Baptist congregations in that region of the state. Sims and his wife, Clara Jane Homer Sims, lived in Dalton, Georgia throughout his ministry. Together they had four children: Ruby, Joseph, Jim, and David.

Elder Sims was known both as a preacher and a musician. He taught music in numerous churches and authored at least one noted hymn, “Unclean Hand,” which he wrote in the 1930s before losing his sight. He attributed his remarkable memory to a gift from God and continued to find spiritual comfort in Scripture, reading the Bible daily until blindness prevented him from doing so.

Sims’s hymns appear in various Primitive Baptist hymnals and reflect themes of heavenly hope and the Christian pilgrimage, with titles such as “This world is not my resting place, I have a home above” and “Over on the hills of glory Where the hallelujahs roll.”