O Holy City Seen of John

Above:  The New Jerusalem and the River of Life

Image in the Public Domain

Text (1910) by Walter Russell Bowie (1882-1969), for Hymns for the Kingdom of God (1910), edited by Henry Sloane Coffin (1877-1954)

Hymn Source = American Hymns Old and New (1980)

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O Holy City seen of John,

Where Christ the Lamb doth reign,

Within whose foursquare walls shall come

No night, nor need, nor pain,

And where the tears are wiped from eyes

That shall not weep again.

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Hark, how from men whose lives are held

More cheap than merchandise,

From women struggling sore for bread,

From little children’s cries,

There swells the sobbing human plaint

That bids thy walls arise.

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O shame to us who rest content

While lust and greed for gain

In street and shop and tenement

Wring gold from human pain,

And bitter lips in blind despair

Cry, “Christ hath died in vain!”

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Give us, O God, the strength to build

The City that hath stood

Too long a dread, whose laws are love,

Whose ways are brotherhood,

And where the sun that shineth is

God’s grace for human good.