"He is Succour to the brave"

With Independence Day at the end of this week, I have resurrected my blogging for a bit. Tonight we shall visit a beautiful old hymn written in the shadow of a camp of Union soldiers stationed outside Washington D.C. early in the Civil War. I always enjoy looking up the lyrics to these old hymns as they are inevitably richer than the few verses I tend to remember. I do sing this one to my children at bedtime. However, I usually can only remember the 1st, 2nd, and 5th verses.

There is so much more here, I may have to expend some effort to recall them all next I share this with my little ones.

BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;

He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:

His truth is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

His truth is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,

They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;

I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:

His day is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

His day is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel:

"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;

Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,

Since God is marching on."

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Since God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;

He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat:

Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!

Our God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Our God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,

With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:

As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,

While God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

While God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

He is coming like the glory of the morning on the wave,

He is Wisdom to the mighty, He is Succour to the brave,

So the world shall be His footstool, and the soul of Time His slave,

Our God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Our God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Bedtime Reflections

Barack Obama is on the major networks right now. I would normally be watching such an event. A political candidate with so much money to throw around that he's buying an entire half-hour of primetime on three major networks. However, I know he will just infuriate and depress me.
Instead I am clinging to God and guns, to turn a phrase (if only I were kidding... Remington 870's are on sale at Dick's Sporting Goods this week). So rather than listen to the political grandstanding and sugar-coated shredding of our Constitution I am listening to my two year old son sing along with Fernando Ortega as he blesses us with some hymns. Allow me to share one of my favorites with you. Written in 1787 it has lifted the souls of Christians through many a dark hour,

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
is laid for your faith in his excellent word!
What more can he say than to you he hath said,
to you that for refuge to Jesus have fled?

"Fear not, I am with thee; O be not dismayed!
For I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;
I'll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.

"When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
the rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;
for I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,
and sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

"When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,
my grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply;
the flame shall not hurt thee; I only design
thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.

"The soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose,
I will not, I will not desert to its foes;
that soul, though all hell shall endeavor to shake,
I'll never, no, never, no, never forsake."

Beautiful. Now, I must be off to tend to the afformentioned son as he protests the audacity of bedtime.

~ Gabriel