O Day of Rest and Gladness

O Day of Rest and Gladness

Text written in 1862 by Christopher Wordsworth (1807-1885)

Sung to ELLACOMBE, from the "Gesangbuch der Herzogl, Hofkapelle, 1784

Also sung to MENDEBRAS, a German melody arranged in 1839 by Lowell Mason (1792-1872)

Isaiah 6:3 And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”

V. 1 O day of rest and gladness,

O day of joy and light,

O balm of care and sadness,

Most beautiful, most bright;

On thee, the high and lowly,

Who bend before the throne,

Sing, Holy, holy, holy, 

To the Eternal One.

Deuteronomy 3:27 Go up to the top of Pisgah and look west and north and south and east. Look at the land with your own eyes, since you are not going to cross this Jordan. 

V. 2 Thou art a port protected

From storms that round us rise,

A garden intersected

With streams of Paradise;

Thou art a cooling fountain

In life's dry, dreary sand;

From thee, like Pisgah's mountain,

We view our promised land.

Hebrews 4:9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God.

V. 3 A day of sweet reflection

Thou art, a day of love;

A day to raise affection

From earth to things above.

New graces ever gaining

From this our day of rest,

We seek the rest remaining

In mansions of the blest.