For 40 years Vernon Higham exercised a hugely influential ministry at Heath Evangelical Church, Cardiff.
He wrote, according to Evangelicals Now in 2000, the second most popular hymn from the last century, Great is the Gospel of our Glorious God, and he was a close friend of Dr Lloyd Jones, preaching at both his and Mrs Lloyd Jones’s funeral.
Mr Higham was born on 25 December 1926 in Caernarfon, North Wales, spending his childhood just outside Bolton where he attended the Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Chapel. He trained as an art teacher, but then felt called to the gospel ministry. It was during his second term at Theological College in Aberystwyth that he was converted through the witness of his fellow students. After two brief pastorates in West Wales and Pontarddulais he moved in 1962 to the Welsh capital. He was a first language Welsh speaker and when he arrived at the Heath he had only preached in English six times before.
