IN every time and place,
Who serve the Lord most high,
Are called his sovereign will to embrace,
And still their own deny;
To follow his command,
On earth as pilgrims rove,
And seek an undiscovered land,
And house, and friends above.
Father, the narrow path
To that far country show;
And in the steps of Abraham’s faith
Enable me to go,
A cheerful sojourner
Where’er thou bidd’st me roam,
Till, guided by thy Spirit here,
I reach my heavenly home.
Charles Wesley
This is a ‘double short metre’, so that’s where you need to look for a tune. Diademata (Crown him with many crowns) fits the case, I think
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Tim Chesterton 10.18.09 at 1:24 pm
It’s good on the ‘pilgrim’ bit, but it shares the overemphasis of its time on a future home in heaven, rather than in new bodies on a transformed earth.
Still, I really like the ‘cheerful sojourner’ line.
Richard 10.18.09 at 8:49 pm
I know what you mean, and I suspect Wesley would too (though I hesitate to speak for him!) As he put it in a more famous hymn: “Anticipate your heaven below, | And own that love is heaven”