Come, thou Fount of every blessing,
tune my heart to sing thy grace;
streams of mercy, never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it,
mount of thy redeeming love.
Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
hither by thy help I'm come;
and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
wandering from the fold of God;
he, to rescue me from danger,
interposed his precious blood.
O to grace how great a debtor
daily I'm constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here's my heart, O take and seal it,
seal it for thy courts above.
(Robert Robinson 1758)
There is much I could say about this hymn. I just love it. LOVE IT. But for sake of time I'm going to pick a few phrases that really grab me every time I hear it and leave YOUR heart to grab what it needs to.
First, a lesson in Hebrew. Ebenezer (second stanza) is Hebrew for "Stone of Help" and comes from 1 Samuel 7:12. In light of that definition perhaps you won't think of Ebenezer Scrooge when you read/sing that particular word! HA!
Okay, on the serious side of things.
"....Tune my heart to sing thy grace...." And who doesn't need to be more gracious? Who doesn't need more of GOD'S grace (so different from our own versions)?
"Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love; here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above." We are all wanderers and until we find our rest and security in our Creator we will wander. The things of this world tempt us to leave behind the narrow way for the broad way but this cry is mine. Take my heart Lord and seal it in so I cannot wander far from you. So the seal upon my life always compels me to turn back toward you.
The ironic story to this hymn is that Mr. Robinson wrote it when he was young, 23 years old, and then proceeded to live a life that did not please God and one day, years after he wrote it, he was riding with a woman who was reading a hymnal and she read aloud to him the very hymn he had written not knowing she was reading it back to the author. When she asked him what he thought of it he broke down crying in front of her and said, ""Madam, I am the poor unhappy man who wrote that hymn many years ago, and I would give a thousand worlds, if I had them, to enjoy the feelings I had then." The beauty of God's grace is that no matter where you have been or are you can make the choice to fix your eyes and heart upon Jesus and find true happiness. Mr. Robinson was an extremely unhappy man apart from God. His choices did not fulfill him nor did his search to express himself in ways contrary to how God had created him. We think we want and need the freedom to explore this world and different expressions of faith but in the end those things we seek make us unhappy. Allowing God to seal our heart to his satisfies the restless spirit.
Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing
tune my heart to sing thy grace;
streams of mercy, never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it,
mount of thy redeeming love.
Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
hither by thy help I'm come;
and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
wandering from the fold of God;
he, to rescue me from danger,
interposed his precious blood.
O to grace how great a debtor
daily I'm constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here's my heart, O take and seal it,
seal it for thy courts above.
(Robert Robinson 1758)
There is much I could say about this hymn. I just love it. LOVE IT. But for sake of time I'm going to pick a few phrases that really grab me every time I hear it and leave YOUR heart to grab what it needs to.
First, a lesson in Hebrew. Ebenezer (second stanza) is Hebrew for "Stone of Help" and comes from 1 Samuel 7:12. In light of that definition perhaps you won't think of Ebenezer Scrooge when you read/sing that particular word! HA!
Okay, on the serious side of things.
"....Tune my heart to sing thy grace...." And who doesn't need to be more gracious? Who doesn't need more of GOD'S grace (so different from our own versions)?
"Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love; here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above." We are all wanderers and until we find our rest and security in our Creator we will wander. The things of this world tempt us to leave behind the narrow way for the broad way but this cry is mine. Take my heart Lord and seal it in so I cannot wander far from you. So the seal upon my life always compels me to turn back toward you.
The ironic story to this hymn is that Mr. Robinson wrote it when he was young, 23 years old, and then proceeded to live a life that did not please God and one day, years after he wrote it, he was riding with a woman who was reading a hymnal and she read aloud to him the very hymn he had written not knowing she was reading it back to the author. When she asked him what he thought of it he broke down crying in front of her and said, ""Madam, I am the poor unhappy man who wrote that hymn many years ago, and I would give a thousand worlds, if I had them, to enjoy the feelings I had then." The beauty of God's grace is that no matter where you have been or are you can make the choice to fix your eyes and heart upon Jesus and find true happiness. Mr. Robinson was an extremely unhappy man apart from God. His choices did not fulfill him nor did his search to express himself in ways contrary to how God had created him. We think we want and need the freedom to explore this world and different expressions of faith but in the end those things we seek make us unhappy. Allowing God to seal our heart to his satisfies the restless spirit.
Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing
This was played on guitar at David Albertson's wedding several years ago and it was very compellingly done at that time. One of my favorites as well.
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