Watch: Message from former DUP MP William McCrea in COVID-19 isolation - ‘in these trying times keep looking up’

Earlier this week before Prime Minister Boris Johnson imposed strict guidelines on social contact - and urged everyone to work from home, only leaving on essential journeys - a video of MrMcCrea singing was posted on his son’s Facebook page.

And today when asked for a message of support for people who are also self-isolating in a bid to stop the spread of COVID-19, the former Free Presbyterian minister, from Magherafelt, said: “In these trying times many feel hopeless with no way through or out of this calamity.

“I am so glad I know the ONE who can bring you through.

“His Name is ‘The Lord Jesus’

“Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there.

“Keep looking up. Wm”.

In an interview with a local paper in 2018 he said it was ‘God’s will’ that he retire from his ministry after almost half a century in the pulpit.

The fiery Free Presbyterian preacher said his ministry first brought him to Magherafelt in 1968 but soon he was feeling the call to politics too - winning seats in Mid-Ulster before making the leap to South Antrim where he faced his last stand in 2015 after a decade as MP.

He enjoyed a third string to his bow - recording dozens of gospel albums that won him a legion of fans at home and abroad.

He was was created a life peer on 19 June 2018 taking the title Baron McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown, of Magherafelt in the County of Londonderry and of Cookstown in the County of Tyrone.