Hear Me, O God, Nor Hide Thy Face

Isaac Watts

Hear me, O God, nor hide thy face but answer, lest I die;

Hast thou not built a throne of grace to hear when sinners cry?

My days are wasted like the smoke dissolving in the air

My strength is dried, my heart is broke and sinking in despair.

My spirits flag like with'ring grass burnt with excessive heat;

In secret groans my minutes pass and I forget to eat.

But thou forever art the same, O my eternal God!

Ages to come shall know thy name and spread they works abroad.

Thou wilt arise and show thy face, nor will my Lord delay

Beyond th' appointed hour of grace, that long expected day.

He hears his saints, he knows their cry, and by mysterious ways

Redeems the pris'ners doomed to die and fills their tongues with praise.

This is one of the pieces that Oasis Chorale will be performing this summer. The arrangement is by Alice Parker which means it is pretty near sheer genius.  We will be singing it in rough, early-American style.  I think it will end up being a fun piece to perform and definitely a new sound for most audiences.  :)  However, what really struck me was the text of this piece.  I find that it is the cry of my heart.

The feeling of emptiness—we all know it. That hopeless, energy-less feeling of worthlessness. Recognizing the depths of our sin and feeling that there will never be enough grace to cover it all. We are hungry. We are broken beyond our own repair. This song is the desperate plea for mercy and grace in light of the our sin-ridden beings. It is seeing ourselves in light of who we are. Defiled. Distorted. Dysfunctional. Dirty. (There sure are a lot of “d” words to describe the broken us.) Proud. Broken. Depressed. Then it calls upon the Truth—who God is. It is the sinner, in desperation, begging God to be who he says he is. Asking him to show up and redeem the despicable piece of dirt that we are. It is believing that He can and will redeem us to the point that our hearts are completely transformed and our mouths are filled with praise and joy. Believing that he will take us from the worst to the best. This is what we long for. And we hope with all our beings in these moments of despair in what we know to be true. We hang on with every remaining ounce of strength there is because it is our ONLY hope. And when it happens, it is a work of the supernatural. We do not understand how redemption happens. We only know that we have been redeemed. We are no longer facing death. We are free.