Scripture Verse

Thy hand [shall] lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. Psalm 139:10

Introduction

portrait
William Gardiner
1770–1853
British Museum
cc-license

Words: Phi­lip Dodd­ridge (1702–1751). Pub­lished post­hu­mous­ly in Hymns Found­ed on Va­ri­ous Texts in the Ho­ly Scrip­tures, by Job Or­ton (Shrop­shire, Eng­land: Jo­shua Ed­dowes & John Cot­ton, 1755), num­ber 257: Help ob­tained of God.

Music: Ger­ma­ny Sac­red Me­lo­dies, by Will­iam Gar­di­ner, 1815 (🔊 pdf nwc).

portrait
Philip Doddridge (1702–1751)

Lyrics

Great God, we sing That migh­ty hand,
By which sup­port­ed still we stand:
The op­en­ing year Thy mer­cy shows,
That mer­cy crowns it, till it close.

By day, by night, at home, abroad,
Still are we guard­ed by our God,
By His in­ces­sant boun­ty fed,
By His un­er­ring coun­sel led.

With grate­ful hearts the past we own;
The fu­ture, all to us un­known,
We to Thy guard­ian care com­mit,
And peace­ful leave be­fore Thy feet.

In scenes ex­alt­ed or de­pressed,
Thou art our joy, and Thou our rest;
Thy good­ness all our hopes shall raise,
Adored through all our chang­ing days.

When death shall in­ter­rupt these songs,
And seal in si­lence mor­tal tongues,
Our help­er God, in whom we trust,
In bet­ter worlds our souls shall boast.