Firstpublished:1779 in Andrew Law's Select Harmony, Edition 2 Description: Words by Charles Wesley, 1745, Hymns for the Lord's Supper no. 20, with nine stanzas. Babcock used the fourth stanza of Wesley's hymn in his composition. Wesley wrote to the meter 76. 76. 76. 76., but Babcock has added an extra syllable to the seventh line, making the meter of this song 76. 76. 76. 86.
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Original text and translations
English text
1. God of unexampled grace,
Redeemer of mankind,
Matter of eternal praise
We in thy passion find:
Still our choicest strains we bring,
Still the joyful theme pursue,
Thee the friend of sinners sing
Whose love is ever new.
2. Endless scenes of wonder rise
With that mysterious tree,
Crucified before our eyes
Where we our Maker see:
Jesus, Lord, what hast thou done!
Publish we the death divine,
Stop, and gaze, and fall, and own
Was never love like thine!
3. Never love nor sorrow was
Like that my Jesus showed;
See him stretched on yonder cross
And crushed beneath our load!
Now discern the deity,
Now his heavenly birth declare!
Faith cries out ’Tis he, ’tis he,
My God that suffers there!
4. Jesus drinks the bitter cup;
The wine-press treads alone,
Tears the graves and mountains up
By his expiring groan:
Lo! The powers of heaven he shakes;
Nature in convulsions lies,
Earth’s profoundest center quakes, (a)
The great Jehovah dies!
5. Dies the glorious cause of all,
The true eternal Pan,
Falls to raise us from our fall,
To ransom sinful man:
Well may sol withdraw his light,
With the sufferer sympathize,
Leave the world in sudden night,
While his Creator dies.
6. Well may heaven be clothed with black
And solemn sackcloth wear,
Jesus' agony partake
The hour of darkness share:
Mourn the astonished hosts above,
Silence saddens all the skies,
Kindler of seraphic love
The God of angels dies.
7. O my God, he dies for me,
I feel the mortal smart!
See him hanging on the tree —
A sight that breaks my heart!
O that all to thee might turn!
Sinners, ye may love him too,
Look on him ye pierced, and mourn
For one who bled for you.
8. Weep o’er your desire and hope
With tears of humblest love;
Sing, for Jesus is gone up,
And reigns enthroned above!
Lives our head, to die no more:
Power is all to Jesus given,
Worshiped as he was before
Th’ immortal King of heaven.
9. Lord, we bless thee for thy grace,
And truth which never fail,
Hastening to behold thy face
Without a dimming veil:
We shall see our heavenly King,
All thy glorious love proclaim,
Help the angel choirs to sing
Our dear triumphant Lamb.