Words: , Hymns and Sac­red Po­ems, 1740, alt.:

Written dur­ing the dis­putes be­tween the Wes­leys and the Mo­ra­vi­ans con­cern­ing An­ti­mon­i­an­ism and Per­fec­tion­ism. Dr. Jack­son sums up the con­tro­ver­sy in his Mem­oirs of C. Wes­ley (abridged ed., 1848, p. 98) thus:—

Molther was the most act­ive and stren­u­ous in prop­a­gat­ing the er­rors by which ma­ny were mis­led. He con­tend­ed that there are no de­grees in faith; so that those who have not the full and un­cloud­ed as­sur­ance of the di­vine fa­vour, what­ev­er they may pos­sess be­sides, have no faith at all. Ano­ther ten­et which he avowed and de­fend­ed was, that till men have faith, they are not to use any of the means of grace, such as the read­ing of the Script­ures, at­tend­ing the min­is­try of the Gos­pel, and re­ceiv­ing the Ho­ly Com­mun­ion; these ord­i­nanc­es be­ing ra­ther in­jur­i­ous than ben­e­fi­cial, till men have a true and vi­tal faith…The fine hymn on Christ­ian ord­i­nanc­es…was writ­ten by Mr. C. Wes­ley at this per­i­od [1739-40], as an an­ti­dote to the mis­chiev­ous er­rors which were pre­va­lent.

Music: St. Fran­ces, , 1861.