Above: Harry Emerson Fosdick
Image in the Public Domain
Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) was the founding minister of the Riverside Church, New York, New York, and one of the most prominent liberal Protestant ministers in the United States during the twentieth century. He, according to many fundamentalists, a rank heretic, has remained in death what he was to them in life: a figure of scorn and controversy, even a bête noir. Fosdick was also an advocate for peace and for African-American civil rights in the country.
Fosdick’s four hymns have never ceased to relevant.
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God of Grace and God of Glory:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/10/04/god-of-grace-and-god-of-glory/
O God, in Restless Living:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/10/04/o-god-in-restless-living/
O God, Who to a Loyal Home:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/10/04/o-god-who-to-a-loyal-home/
The Prince of Peace His Banner Spreads:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/10/04/the-prince-of-peace-his-banner-spreads/
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Above: Riverside Church and Grant’s Tomb, New York, New York
Image in the Public Domain
Hymn (1930) by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969), for the opening of the Riverside Church, New York, New York, in 1930
Hymn Sources = The Hymnal (1941), Evangelical and Reformed Church; Hymnal and Liturgies of the Moravian Church (1969), Moravian Church in America
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God of grace and God of glory,
On Thy people pour Thy power;
Crown Thine ancient church’s story;
Bring her bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, Grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.
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Lo! the hosts of evil round us
Scorn Thy Christ, assail his ways!
From the fears that long have bound us
Free our hearts to faith and praise:
Grant us wisdom, Grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.
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Cure Thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to Thy control;
Shame our wanton, selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, Grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.
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Set our feet on lofty places;
Gird our lives that they may be
Armored with all Christlike graces
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, Grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee!
That we fail not man nor Thee!
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Save us from weak resignation
To the evils we deplore;
Let the search for Thy salvation
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, Grant us courage
Serving Thee Whom we adore,
Serving Thee Whom we adore.
Above: Apotheosis of War, by Vasily Vereshchagin
Image in the Public Domain
Text (1930) by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969)
Hymn Source = The Hymnal (1941), Evangelical and Reformed Church
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The Prince of Peace His banner spreads,
His wayward folk to lead
From war’s embattled hates and dreads,
Its bulwarked ire and greed.
O marshal us, the sons of sires
Who braved the cannon’s roar,
To venture all that peace requires
As they dared death for war.
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Lead on, O Christ! That haunting song
No centuries can dim,
Which long ago the heavenly throng
Sang over Bethlehem;
Cast down our rancor, fear, and pride,
Exalt goodwill again!
Our worship doth Thy name deride,
Bring we not peace to men.
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Thy pardon, Lord, for war’s dark shame,
Its death-strewn, bloody fields!
Yet thanks to Thee for souls aflame
Who dared with swords and shields!
O Christ, who died to give men life,
Bring that victorious hour,
When man shall use for peace, not strife,
His valor, skill, and power.
Above: Father and Son
Image in the Public Domain
Hymn Source = Hymnal and Liturgies of the Moravian Church (1969), Moravian Church in America
Text (1956) by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969)
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O God, Who to a loyal home
Didst trust Thy Son divine,
Where faithful love and patient work
Made daily life benign;
With contrite shame Thy grace we claim
And lift to Thee our prayer;
Redeem our oft unworthy homes
Till all is Christlike there.
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Deliver us from sins which harm
Our homes, and mar their peace.
May selfless and devoted love
Make strife and discord cease.
With anxious zeal, for mankind’s weal
And worldwide peace we pray,
But all in vain, if wayward homes
Cause childhood’s steps to stray.
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Thou art our Father, and from Thee
All faithful families spring;
To homes where love and honor dwell
Thou dost Thy blessing bring.
O God of love, send from above
Thy succor, swift and strong,
That from such homes stout souls may come
To triumph over wrong.
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We pray that childhood’s latent powers
May grow to bless mankind,
That we may guide aright young lives
For unguessed good designed.
O Father God, Whose Son has trod
Such lowly paths as we,
Help us to build on earth true homes,
Till we come home to Thee.
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Above: People Crossing Pedestrian Lane, by Abby Chung
Image in the Public Domain
Text (1931) by Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969)
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O God, in restless living we lose our spirit’s peace.
Calm our unwise confusion, bid thou our clamor cease.
Let anxious hearts grow quiet, like pools at evening still,
till thy reflected heaves all our spirits fill.
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Teach us, beyond our striving, the rich rewards of rest.
Who does not live serenely is never deeply bless’d.
O tranquil, radiant Sunlight, bring thou our lives to flow’r,
less wearied with our effort, more aware of pow’r.
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Receptive make our spirits, our need is to be still.
As dawn fades flick’ring candle, so dim our anxious will.
Reveal thy radiance through us, thine ample strength release.
Not ours, but thine the triumph in the pow’r of peace.
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We grow not wise by struggling, we gain but things by strain.
We cease to water gardens, when comes thy plenteous rain.
O, beautify our spirits in restfulness from strife,
enrich our souls in secret with abundant life.
Above: Walter Chalmers Smith
Image in the Public Domain
Walter Chalmers Smith (1824-1908) was a prominent minister in the Free Church of Scotland (through the merger of 1900) then in the United Free Church of Scotland.
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Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/08/15/immortal-invisible-god-only-wise/
One Thing I of the Lord Desire:
https://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2018/08/15/one-thing-i-of-the-lord-desire/
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Above: Grace Episcopal Church, Gainesville, Georgia, July 7, 2018
Image Source = Bill Monk, Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta
Text (1887) by Walter Chalmers Smith (1824-1908)
Hymn Source = The Church Hymnary–Revised Edition (1927), of various Presbyterian denominations
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One thing I of the Lord desire,–
For all my way hath miry been–
Be it by water for by fire,
O make me clean!
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If clearer vision Thou impart,
Grateful and glad my soul shall be;
But yet to have a purer heart
Is more to me.
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Yea, only as the heart is clean
May larger vision yet be mine,
For mirrored in its depths are seen
The things divine.
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I watch to shun the miry way,
And stanch the spring of guilty thought;
But, watch and wrestle as I may,
Pure I am not.
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O wash Thou me without, within,
Or purge with fire, if that must be,–
No matter how, if only sin
Die out in me.
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