Scripture Verse

Comfort ye, comfort ye My people, saith your God. Isaiah 40:1

Introduction

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Charles Wesley (1707–1788)

Words: Charles Wes­ley, Hymns and Sac­red Po­ems (Bris­tol, Eng­land: Fe­lix Far­ley, 1742), page 1.

Music: Rest (Brad­bu­ry) Will­iam B. Brad­bu­ry, 1843 (🔊 pdf nwc).

portrait
William B. Bradbury (1816–1868)

Lyrics

Comfort, ye min­is­ters of grace,
Comfort the peo­ple of your Lord,
Oh! lift ye up the fall­en race,
And cheer them by the Gos­pel word.

Go, in­to ev­ery na­tion, go!
Speak to their tremb­ling hearts, and cry,
Glad tid­ings un­to all we show;
Jerusalem, thy God is nigh.

Accomplished is thy le­gal war,
The man­tle o’er thy sins is spread;
Thy God the pun­ish­ment hath bore,
Thy God the debt hath more than paid.

Punished thou art, for He hath died
The mer­it of His death is thine,
Absolved, and free­ly jus­ti­fied,
And clothed in right­eous­ness di­vine.

Hark, in the wil­der­ness a cry,
A voice that loud­ly calls, Pre­pare!
Prepare your hearts, for God is nigh,
And means to make His en­trance there.

The Lord your God shall quick­ly come:
Sinners, re­pent, the call ob­ey;
Open your hearts to make Him room,
Ye de­sert souls, pre­pare His way.

The Lord shall clear His way thro’ all,
Whate’er ob­structs, ob­structs in vain;
The vale shall rise, the mount­ain fall,
Crooked be straight, and rugg­ed plain.

Nature per­verse and rough shall yield,
Th’aspiring droop, the ab­ject dare;
Alike by so­ve­reign grace com­pelled,
Despair shall hope, and pride des­pair.

When all into sub­ject­ion brought
Level shall lie, and hum­bly low,
Who cap­ti­vat­ed ev­ery thought,
His glo­ry then the Lord shall show.

The glo­ry of the Lord dis­played
Together all man­kind shall view;
And what His mouth in truth hath said,
His own al­migh­ty hand shall do.