Scripture Verse

Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in My holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand. Joel 2:1

Introduction

Words: Charles Wes­ley, Hymns for Times of Trou­ble and Per­se­cu­tion, se­cond edi­tion, en­larged (Lon­don: Stra­han, 1744), pag­es 61–63, alt.

Music: Ver­non (In­galls) in Chris­tian Har­mo­ny, by Je­re­mi­ah In­galls, 1805. The ver­sion here is from A Com­pi­la­tion of Gen­ui­ne Church Mu­sic, by Jo­seph Funk, 1835 (🔊 pdf nwc).

If you know where to get a good pic­ture of In­galls (head & shoul­ders, at least 200×300 pix­els),

portrait
Charles Wesley (1707–1788)

Lyrics

Blow ye the trump, in Si­on blow,
That all may hear and un­der­stand,
Their time of vi­si­ta­tion know,
Sound an alarm through­out My land;
Let all the people quake for fear,
The day, the ev­il day is near.

A day of gloom­iness and dread,
A day of clouds and sore af­fright,
As mists up­on the mount­ains spread,
Dark as the deep­est noon of night;
A day where on­ly me­te­ors shine,
A day of right­eous wrath di­vine.

Destruction from the Lord is come,
The ter­ri­ble al­migh­ty Lord,
To seal a guil­ty na­tion’s doom:
Lo! He hath bared th’av­eng­ing sword,
And sent His hos­tile ar­mies forth
To plague, and waste, and shake the earth.

Lo! At His Word th’em­bat­tled pow­ers
Marching in dread ar­ray ap­pear!
A fire be­fore their face de­vours,
A flame is kin­dled by their rear,
Plague, fa­mine, fire and sword are joined,
And ghast­ly ru­in stalks be­hind.

Before their face an Ed­en blooms,
But where the ground­ed staff hath passed,
Their breath the pa­ra­dise con­sumes,
And lays the plea­sant land­scape waste;
No more the seat of joy and peace,
But one great drea­ry wil­der­ness.

As horse­men har­nessed for the fight,
They rush im­pe­tu­ous from afar,
Borne head­long with re­sist­less might,
Loud-rat­tling as the roll­ing car,
Light o’er the mount­ain tops they bound,
The vales with clang­ing arms re­sound.

As fire on crack­ling stub­ble feeds,
And wins its de­so­lat­ed way,
The migh­ty host de­struct­ion spreads,
Wide wast­ing, and de­vours its prey,
With noise con­fused, and shout­ings loud,
And groans, and gar­ments rolled in blood.

Where’er they turn, the peo­ple fail,
Pained and as­ton­ished at the sight,
Their face o’er­spread with dead­ly pale,
Their heart o’er­whelmed with huge af­fright,
Helpless to stand the in­vad­er’s force,
Or stop their all vic­to­ri­ous course.

Nothing against their might shall stand,
While firm­ly ranked in close ar­ray
And mar­shaled by di­vine com­mand;
Secure they urge their ra­pid way,
Or rise when fall­en on the sword,
Unwounded cham­pi­ons of the Lord.

Swift to the slaugh­ter and the spoil
The fierce, in­vul­ner­able pow­ers
Shall run, shall fly; their foe­men foil,
And scale the walls, and mount the tow­ers:
The earth be­neath their rage shall quake,
The bat­tlements of Hea­ven shall shake.

The sun no more shall rule the day,
But set eclipsed in sud­den night;
The moon shall lose her pal­er ray,
The stars with­draw their glim­mer­ing light;
The high­er powers shall dis­ap­pear,
When God, the glo­ri­ous King, is near.

Before His dread­ful camp the Lord
Shall ut­ter His ma­jes­tic voice;
For He is strong, and keeps His Word,
And all His venge­ful pow­er em­ploys
Against the world in that great day,
When Heav’n and earth shall flee away.