Scripture Verse

They rose up in the morning early, and worshiped before the Lord. 1 Samuel 1:19

Introduction

Words: Charles H. Spur­geon, 1866.

Music: Green­wood (Sweet­ser) Jo­seph E. Sweet­ser, A Col­lect­ion of Church Mu­sic (New York: John Wi­ley, 1849), num­ber 161 (🔊 pdf nwc).

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

portrait
Charles H. Spurgeon
(1834–1892)

Lyrics

Sweetly the ho­ly hymn
Breaks on the morn­ing air;
Before the world with smoke is dim
We meet to of­fer pray­er.

While flow­ers are wet with dews,
Dew of our souls, des­cend:
Ere yet the sun the day re­news,
O Lord, Thy Spir­it send.

Upon the bat­tle­field,
Before the fight be­gins,
We seek, O Lord, Thy shel­ter­ing shield,
To guard us from our sins.

Ere yet our ves­sel sails
Upon the stream of day
We plead, O Lord, for hea­v’n­ly gales
To speed us on our way!

On the lone mount­ain side,
Before the morn­ing’s light,
The Man of sor­rows wept and cried,
And rose re­freshed with might.

Oh, hear us then, for we
Are ve­ry weak and frail,
We make the Sav­ior’s name our plea,
And sure­ly must pre­vail.