Hymn

Leader of faithful souls, and Guide
Of all who travel to the sky,
Come, and with us, even us, abide,
Who would on Thee alone rely;
On Thee alone our spirits stay
While held in life’s uneven sway.

We’ve no abiding city here,
But seek a city out of sight;
Thither our steady course we steer,
Aspiring to the plains of light,
Jerusalem, the saints’ abode,
Whose founder is the living God.

Through Thee, who all our sins hast borne,
Freely and graciously forgiven,
With songs to Zion we return,
Contending for our native heaven,
That palace of our glorious King,
We find it nearer while we sing.

Raised by the breath of love divine,
We urge our way with strength renewed,
The Church of the first-born to join,
We travel to the mount of God;
With joy upon our heads arise,
And meet our Captain in the skies.

~Charles Wesley (1707-1788), in Hymns for Those That Seek and Those That Have Redemption in the Blood of Jesus Christ.

Hymn

Come away to the skies, my belovèd, arise
And rejoice in the day thou wast born;
On this festival day, come exulting away,
And with singing to Zion return.

We have laid up our love and our treasure above,
Though our bodies continue below.
The redeemed of the Lord will remember His Word,
And with singing to paradise go.

Now with singing and praise let us spend all the days
By our heavenly Father bestowed,
While His grace we receive from His bounty, and live
To the honor and glory of God!

For the glory we were first created to share,
Both the nature and kingdom divine,
Now created again that our lives may remain
Throughout time and eternity Thine.

We with thanks do approve the design
Of that love that hath joined us to Jesus’ Name;
Now united in heart, let us never more part,
Till we meet at the feast of the Lamb.

There, Oh! there at His feet, we shall all likewise meet,
And be parted in body no more;
We shall sing to our lyres, with the heavenly choirs,
And our Savior in glory adore.

Hallelujah! we sing to our Father and King,
And His rapturous praises repeat:
To the Lamb that was slain, Hallelujah again!
Sing all Heaven and fall at His feet!

~ At­trib­ut­ed to Charles Wes­ley, 1755. Wes­ley wrote this hymn for his wife’s birth­day, tit­ling it “On the Birth­day of a Friend.”

Hymn

Jerusalem, my happy home!
When shall I come to thee?
When shall my labors have an end,
Thy joys when shall I see?

Thy saints are crowned with glory great;
They see God face to face;
They triumph still, they still rejoice
Most happy is their case.

When shall these eyes thy heaven built walls
And pearly gates behold?
Thy bulwarks, with salvation strong,
And streets of shining gold?

There happier bowers than Eden’s bloom,
Nor sin nor sorrow know:
Blest seats, through rude and stormy scenes,
I onward press to you.

Why should I shrink at pain and woe?
Or feel at death dismay?
I’ve Canaan’s goodly land in view,
And realms of endless day.

From every tribe doth music rise,
All nations form the choir:
Ten thousand times that man were blessed
That might this music hear.

Jerusalem, my happy home!
God grant that I may see
Thine endless joys and of the same
Partaker ever be!

O Christ do Thou my soul prepare
For that bright home of love;
That I may see Thee and adore,
With all Thy saints above.

~Joseph Bromehead, 1748-1826; alt. st. Andrew Sherwood, 2005

Hymn

The love of Christ is rich and free;
Fixed on His own eternally;
Nor earth, nor hell, can it remove;
Long as He lives, His own He’ll love

His loving heart engaged to be
Their everlasting Surety;
’Twas love that took their cause in hand,
And love maintains it to the end

Love cannot from its post withdraw;
Nor death, nor hell, nor sin, nor law,
Can turn the Surety’s heart away;
He’ll love His own to endless day

Love has redeemed His sheep with blood;
And love will bring them safe to God;
Love calls them all from death to life;
And love will finish all their strife

He loves through every changing scene,
Nor aught from Him can Zion wean;
Not all the wanderings of her heart
Can make His love for her depart

At death, beyond the grave, He’ll love;
In endless bliss, His own shall prove
The blazing glory of that love
Which never could from them remove

~ William Gadsby, 1773-1844. In 1793, Gads­by joined the Bap­tist Church at Co­ven­try, and in 1798 be­gan to preach. In 1800, a cha­pel was built for him at Des­ford, Lei­ces­ter­shire, and two years lat­er ano­ther in the town of Hinck­ley. In 1805, he moved to Man­ches­ter, be­com­ing min­is­ter of a cha­pel in Roch­dale Road, where he con­tin­ued un­til his death.

Redemption Through Christ

THE second Adam, sov'reign Lord of all,
Did, by his Father's authorizing call,
From bosom of eternal love descend,
To save the guilty race that him offend;
To treat an everlasting peace with those,
Who were, and ever would have been his foes.
His errand, never-ending life to give
To them, whose malice would not let him live;
To make a match with rebels, and espouse
The brat which at his love her spite avows.
Himself he humbled, to depress her pride,
And make his mortal foe his loving bride.
But, ere there marriage can be solemniz'd,
All lets must be remov'd, all parties pleas'd.
Law-righteousness requir'd, must be procur'd,
Law-vengeance threatned, must be full endur'd,
Stern justice must have credit by the match,
Sweet mercy by the heart the bride must catch.
Poor Bankrupt! all her debt must first be paid,
Her former husband in the grave be laid:
Her present Lover must be at the cost,
To save and ransom to the uttermost.
If all these things this Suitor kind can do,
Then he may win her, and her blessing too.
Hard terms indeed! while death's the first demand:
But love is strong as death, to take the upper hand
To carry on the suit, and make it good,
Though at the dearest rate of wounds and blood.
The burden's heavy, but the back is broad,
The glorious Lover is the mighty God.

~The first part of one of several "Gospel Sonnets" by Ralph Erskine [1685-1752], an 18th-century Scottish preacher and pastor. The son of a Puritan minister who was forced out of his living by the 1662 Act of Uniformity, Erskine pastored--first Dumferline Abbey, then Queen Street Church--for over forty years. Throughout his life, Erskine was dedicated to expositional preaching and considered it the most important work of his ministry. He was also a gifted poet, and was fond of setting forth systems of divinity and engaging false doctrine in verse.

Hymn

Come, let us join our cheerful songs
with angels round the throne.
ten thousand thousand are their tongues,
but all their joys are one.

"Worthy the Lamb that died," they cry,
"to be exalted thus!"
"Worthy the Lamb," our hearts reply,
"for he was slain for us!"

Jesus is worthy to receive
honor and power divine;
and blessings more than we can give,
be, Lord, forever thine.

Let all that dwell above the sky,
and air, and earth, and seas,
conspire to lift thy glories high,
and speak thine endless praise!

The whole creation join in one,
to bless the sacred Name
of him who sits upon the throne,
and to adore the Lamb.

~ Isaac Watts, 1674-1748

Watts’ fa­ther was Non­con­form­ist im­pris­oned twice for his re­li­gious views. Isaac learned Greek, Latin, and He­brew un­der Mr. Pin­horn, Rec­tor of All Saints, and head­mas­ter of the Gram­mar School in South­amp­ton. Isaac’s taste for verse showed it­self in ear­ly child­hood, and his prom­ise caused a lo­cal doc­tor and other friends to of­fer him a un­i­ver­si­ty ed­u­ca­tion, as­sum­ing he would be or­dained in the Church of Eng­land. How­ev­er, Isaac de­clined and in­stead en­tered a Non­con­for­mist Acad­e­my...

Hymn

Praise God, from Whom all blessings flow;
Praise Him, all creatures here below;
Praise Him above, ye heav'nly hosts;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Praise God, to Whom all blessings be;
Praise Him, who stand on His decree;
Praise Him Who hath redeemed thy soul;
Praise God, His virtues now extol.

Praise God, in Whom all blessings rest;
Praise Him, His faithfulness attest;
Praise Him with joyful, rev'rent tune;
Praise Holy Godhead, all triune.

~First verse, Thomas Ken, 1837-1711. Ken trained at Win­ches­ter and New Coll­ege, Ox­ford, and was or­dained an Ang­li­can priest in 1662. In 1663, he be­came Rec­tor of Lit­tle East­on, and Rec­tor of Wood­hay and Pre­ben­da­ry of Win­ches­ter in 1669. He pub­lished a Man­u­al of Pray­ers, for the use of the schol­ars of Win­ches­ter Coll­ege, in 1674. He was brief­ly chap­lain to Prin­cess Ma­ry, and lat­er to the Brit­ish fleet. He be­came Bi­shop of Bath and Wells in 1685. He was one of sev­er­al bi­shops im­pris­oned in the Tow­er of Lon­don for re­fus­ing to sign James II’s “De­clar­a­tion of In­dul­gence” (hop­ing to re­store Ca­thol­i­cism in Eng­land); he was tried and ac­quit­ted. Ken wrote much po­e­try, pu­blished post­hu­mous­ly in 1721.

Second and third verses, my own.

Hymn

O day of rest and gladness, of day of joy and light,
O balm of care and sadness, most beautiful, most bright:
On Thee, the high and lowly, through ages joined in tune,
Sing holy, holy, holy, to the great God Triune.

On Thee, at the creation, the light first had its birth;
On Thee, for our salvation, Christ rose from depths of earth;
On Thee, our Lord, victorious, the Spirit sent from heaven,
And thus on Thee, most glorious, a triple light was given.

Thou art a port, protected from storms that round us rise;
A garden, intersected with streams of paradise;
Thou art a cooling fountain in life’s dry, dreary sand;
From thee, like Pisgah’s mountain, we view our promised land.

Thou art a holy ladder, where angels go and come;
Each Sunday finds us gladder, nearer to heaven, our home;
A day of sweet refection, thou art a day of love,
A day of resurrection from earth to things above.

Today on weary nations the heavenly manna falls;
To holy convocations the silver trumpet calls,
Where Gospel light is glowing with pure and radiant beams,
And living water flowing, with soul refreshing streams.

New graces ever gaining from this our day of rest,
We reach the rest remaining to spirits of the blessed.
To Holy Ghost be praises, to Father, and to Son;
The church her voice upraises to Thee, blessed Three in One.

~ Christopher Wordsworth, 1807-1885

Nephew of po­et William Wordsworth, Christ­o­pher was both a schol­ar and ath­lete in his stu­dent days. La­ter, he served as head­mas­ter of Har­row Boys School (1836-1850), which Winston Churchill would at­tend a cen­tu­ry or so lat­er. Words­worth was al­so Vicar at Stanford-in-the-Vale, Berk­shire (1850-1869), and Arch­dea­con of West­minster, and be­came Bi­shop of Lincoln in 1868. A rec­og­nized Greek scholar, he al­so wrote the­o­log­ic­al and other works. Of his hymns, he said, “It is the first du­ty of a hymn to teach sound doc­trine and thence to save souls.”

Hymn

Poor sinner, dejected with fear,
Unbosom thy mind to the Lamb;
No wrath on His brow He does wear,
Nor will He poor mourners condemn;
His arm of omnipotent grace
Is able and willing to save;
A sweet and a permanent peace
He’ll freely and faithfully give.

Come just as thou art, with thy woe,
Fall down at the feet of the Lamb;
He will not, He cannot say, “Go”,
But surely will take out thy stain
A fountain is opened for sin,
And thousands its virtues have proved
He’ll take thee, and plunge thee therein,
And wash thee from filth in His blood.

The soul that on Jesus relies,
He’ll never, no never deceive;
He freely and faithfully gives
More blessings than we can conceive;
Yea, down to old age He will keep,
Nor will He forsake us at last;
He knows and is known by His sheep;
They’re His, and He will hold them fast.

~William Gadsby, 1773-1844

In 1793, Gadsby joined the Baptist Church at Coventry, and in 1798 began to preach. In 1800, a chapel was built for him at Desford, Leicestershire, and two years later another in the town of Hinckley. In 1805, he moved to Manchester, becoming minister of a chapel in Rochdale Road, where he continued until his death. (source: cyberhymnal.org)