When Poetry Meets Hymnody Meets Worship

These are the lyrics to one of my favorite hymns.  The music is beautiful, too, but perhaps a little slow and mournful for today's crowd.  The writer, George Matheson, penned it, I am told, when his fiancee abandoned him after he learned he was going blind. 

 

 O Love that wilt not let me go,

I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.
 

O light that foll’west all my way,
I yield my flick’ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.
 

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.
 

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.