Scripture Verse

Let the saints be joyful in glory: let them sing aloud. Psalm 149:5

Introduction

Words: An­drew Young, 1838.

Music: Hap­py Land Hin­du­sta­ni air, ar­ranged by Le­on­ard P. Breed­love, 1850 (🔊 pdf nwc).

If you know where to get a good pic­ture of Young or Breed­love (head & shoul­ders, at least 200×300 pix­els),

Anecdote

A col­lege stu­dent in Vir­gin­ia, proud of his in­tel­lec­tu­al at­tain­ments, thought if he ev­er be­came a Chris­tian it would be through an el­o­quent ser­mon of some dis­tin­guished pul­pit or­a­tor. While hunt­ing deer dur­ing a va­ca­tion he was drawn to a gorge far away in the moun­tains, by the sound of a sweet fe­male voice, en­gaged in sing­ing. As he drew near­er he re­cog­nized the words of the hymn:—

There is a happy land
Far, far away.

At length he pe­rceived a log cabin, and an old fe­male slave, with hair as white as snow, stand­ing with­out at her wash tub sing­ing away as though her heart was ov­er­flow­ing with glad­ness. She was unu­su­al­ly tall and ve­ry straight.

As the young stu­dent stood en­chant­ed with the ro­man­tic scene, he found that she was al­so blind, and, as she kept on sing­ing and wash­ing, her hap­py soul would be­come so full of joy that she would stop wash­ing, and, for a while straight­en­ing up, and turn­ing her sight­less eye-balls hea­ven­ward, would make the sur­round­ing rocks and moun­tains ring as her joy­ful voice would sing:—

There is a land of pure de­light
Where saints im­mor­tal reign.

At length the stu­dent said to her, Aun­tie, I see you are blind? No, mas­sa, said she, I is not blind. I can’t see you, nor dese trees, nor dese rocks, nor dese moun­tains, but I can see in­to the king­dom. I can see de hap­py land, far, far away.

The young stu­dent was so im­pressed with what he saw and heard that from that time on, he was deep­ly con­vict­ed of sin, and rest­ed not un­til he found rest in Je­sus.

He ev­en­tu­al­ly be­came a min­is­ter, and told the au­thor that the echo of that hap­py slave’s song still fol­lows him.

Long, p. 372

Lyrics

There is a hap­py land, far, far away,
Where saints in glo­ry stand, bright, bright as day.
Oh, how they sweet­ly sing, wor­thy is our Sav­ior king,
Loud let His prais­es ring, praise, praise for aye.

Come to that hap­py land, come, come away;
Why will ye doubt­ing stand, why still de­lay?
Oh, we shall hap­py be, when from sin and sor­row free,
Lord, we shall live with Thee, blest, blest for aye.

Bright, in that hap­py land, beams ev­ery eye;
Kept by a Fa­ther’s hand, love can­not die.
Oh, then to glo­ry run; be a crown and king­dom won;
And, bright, above the sun, we reign for aye.