Scripture Verse

Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised…Glory and honor are in His presence; strength and gladness are in His place. 1 Chronicles 16:25–27

Introduction

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Ralph P. Merrifield
1957–

Words & Mu­sic: Ralph P. Mer­ri­field & Le­on­ard E. Smith, 1993 & 1996. Ar­ranged by Lou­is Webb (🔊 pdf nwc).

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Leonard E. Smith
1942–

I or­ig­in­al­ly wrote Splen­dor and Ma­jes­ty in 1993…and mo­di­fied it while nav­i­gat­ing bum­per-to-bum­per com­mut­er traf­fic on Route 128 (just south of Bos­ton, Mas­sa­chu­setts)! Brent­wood Mu­sic in Nash­ville showed an ear­ly in­ter­est in the song, but they didn’t have any pro­jects in the works that matched the style.

In the Spring of 1996, Len­ny Smith called to see if I’d like to do some co-writ­ing with him (New Hope and New Je­ru­sa­lem Mu­sic hap­pened to be next to each other al­pha­be­tic­al­ly in the CCLI Pub­lish­ers List!) Af­ter lis­ten­ing to all my re­cord­ings, he asked per­mis­sion to re­shape the lyr­ics and me­lo­dy of Splen­dor and Ma­jesty, and that is how it came to have its cur­rent form.

Ralph Merrifield

Lyrics

Splendor and majesty are before You!
Strength and joy are in Your dwelling place!
Mercy and kindness, full of forgiveness!
Great are You, Lord, honored and worthy of praise!
Splendor and majesty! Honor and Glory!
Holy are You, O, Lord, Lamb of God!
Your love exceeds our fondest dreams,
Your power conquers ev’rything.
Grace and truth flow from Your throne—
Awesome God! Awesome God!

Repeat