Righteous, O Lord, are all Thy ways!
Thy judg­ments in the an­cient days
On un­re­pent­ing sin­ners fell;
Thy wrath des­cend­ed, in a flood,
On a whole world that knew not God,
And swept their thought­less souls to hell.
Yet in the uni­vers­al wreck,
Thou didst a kind ex­cept­ion make,
In fa­vor of a child of Thine:
Thou didst for him an ark pro­vide,
And safe­ly with his house­hold hide
The heir of right­eous­ness di­vine.

Thou art in ev­ery age the same,
And when our crimes the ven­geance claim,
And when our mea­sure is filled up;
Thine an­ger yet again shall burn,
And force them who Thy mer­cies spurn,
To drink the bit­ter trem­bling cup.
Thou, Lord, out of Thy place shalt rise,
Open the win­dows of the skies,
To plague the peo­ple of Thine ire,
Thy flam­ing min­is­ters em­ploy,
And ter­ri­bly at last de­stroy,
The wick­ed with a flood of fire.

Great God, if now Thy day is near,
Alarm us with a sac­red fear,
And snatch from a de­vot­ed race,
A world, who, as Thy Son fore­told,
Harden their hearts like those of old,
And live cor­rupt in all their ways.
They eat, they drink, they plant, they build,
Their hearts, with cares and plea­sures filled,
No room can find for thoughts of Thee,
Till the last dread­ful plagues com­mence,
And sweep their care­less spir­its hence
Into a sad eter­ni­ty.

But wilt Thou not Thine own se­cure?
The men, who great dis­tress en­dure,
And cru­el mock­ings for Thy sake,
Who tremble at Thy to­kens nigh,
And to the ark of mer­cy fly,
And Je­su’s wounds their re­fuge make!
Surely Thou wilt Thy word ful­fill,
And give Thy cau­tioned people still,
Within the sac­red ark to rest;
E’en now by faith we en­ter in,
And mount above the floods of sin,
Secure in our Re­deem­er’s breast.

Superior to the storms be­low,
The va­ri­ous storms of hu­man woe,
Shut up in Christ we mount, we rise,
Buoyed by His migh­ty Spir­it up,
Above the highe­st mount­ain’s top,
Above the rui­ned earth, and skies.
When earth and skies are all on fire,
We then shall mount di­vine­ly high­er,
As by Eli­jah’s whirl­wind driv’n,
Triumphant o’er the blaz­ing flood,
The Church, and fa­mi­ly of God,
Our ark and we shall rest in Heav’n.