Just by way of contrast, the very first time I ever heard Leaning on the Everlasting Arms was in a movie, Night of the Hunter, sung by Robert Mitchum and Lillian Gish. Mitchum plays a fake preacher who kills people; Gish protects orphaned children from him. It’s the only movie ever directed by Charles Laughton.
I can’t explain what the hymn is doing in the movie, but it feels right. Something must have made it right to be there, or I wouldn’t have remembered it for so many years.