Scripture Verse

I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Jeremiah 31:3

Introduction

portrait
Charles Wesley (1707–1788)

Words: Charles Wes­ley, in his tract Hymns on God’s Ev­er­last­ing Love, 1741. The orig­in­al had 27 vers­es.

Music: Ham­burg Lo­well Ma­son, 1824 (🔊 pdf nwc). First pub­lished in The Bos­ton Han­del and Hay­dn So­cie­ty Col­lect­ion of Church Mu­sic, third edi­tion, 1825.

Alternate Tune:

  • Beethoven ar­ran­ger un­known, be­fore 1895 (🔊 pdf nwc)
portrait
Lowell Mason (1792–1872)

Anecdote

John John­son, of Gun­ner­side, Reeth, was brought to God un­der a ser­mon preached by Ri­chard Bux­ton, a lo­cal preach­er. Im­me­di­ate­ly he be­gan to seek the souls of oth­ers, and be­came in turn a lead­er and lo­cal preach­er, and was made a bless­ing to ma­ny.

On the day of his death he had preached at Gayle, and, at tea with a friend at Hawes, spoke of being as hap­py as he could be. In the ev­en­ing he op­ened the ser­vice at Hawes, and gave out the 39th Hymn, the last two lines be­ing—

Lift up the stand­ard of Thy cross,
And all shall own Thou died’st for all.

He com­menced to pray, and had ut­tered a sen­tence of ado­ra­tion, when he fell in the pul­pit; his spi­rit went straight to the pa­ra­dise of God, 30th No­vem­ber, 1861, aged for­ty-five.

Stevenson, pp. 50–51

Lyrics

Father, whose ev­er­last­ing love
Thy on­ly Son for sin­ners gave,
Whose grace to all did free­ly move,
And sent Him down the world to save;

Help us Thy mer­cy to ex­tol,
Immense, un­fa­thomed, un­con­fined;
To praise the Lamb who died for all,
The ge­ne­ral Sav­ior of man­kind.

Thy un­dis­ting­uish­ing re­gard
Was cast on Ad­am’s fall­en race;
For all Thou hast in Christ pre­pared
Sufficient, so­ve­reign, sav­ing grace.

The world He suf­fered to redeem;
For all He hath the atone­ment made;
For those that will not come to Him
The ran­som of His life was paid.

Why then, Thou uni­vers­al Love,
Should any of Thy grace des­pair?
To all, to all, Thy bow­els move,
But strait­ened in our own we are.

Arise, O God, main­tain Thy cause!
The full­ness of the Gen­tiles call;
Lift up the stand­ard of Thy cross,
And all shall own Thou diedst for all.