He will be our guide even to the end.
Psalm 48:14
Words: Shoveller, in A New Selection of Seven Hundred Evangelical Hymns, edited by John Dobell (Morristown: Peter A. Johnson, 1810), number 658.
Music: Church Triumphant James W. Elliott, 1874 (🔊 pdf nwc).
If you know Shoveller’s full name, or have access to a good picture of him of Elliott (head & shoulders, at least 200×300 pixels),
Blest be th’Eternal Infinite!
Whose skill conducts this rolling sphere,
Who rules our day, who guards our night,
And guides the swift, revolving year!
Our race are falling every hour,
While we distinguished yet appear:
’Tis of Thy matchless love and power.
That we are spared another year.
Oh! for a sweet refreshing time;
Father! Thy children wish Thee near:
Come, and our joys shall be sublime,
While we begin another year.
Now may Thy Spirit’s love reveal,
And make our heav’nly prospects clear;
Our interest in them may we feel,
While we pass on from year to year.
May that good Spirit be our guide,
During our stay as pilgrims here;
Nor let us from our God backslide,
As we have done the former year.
Strengthen our faith, increase our love,
Fill us with godly, filial fear;
And to Thy waiting children prove
Thy grace thro’ every fleeting year,
This truth impress on every soul,
That vast eternity is near—
That time’s swift moments onward roll,
To bring the last…the closing year.
When nature in a blaze shall die,
Or death conclude our being here,
Then to our Jesus may we fly,
To spend a never-ending year.