As Pants the Hart

As Pants the Hart

Text written by Nahum Tate (1652-1715) and Nicholas Brady (1659-1726) in the "New Version, 1696"

Sung to MARTYRDOM, composed by Hugh Wilson (1766-1824), adapted in 1825 by Robert A. Smith (1780-1829)

Psalm 42:1-5 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.  My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?  My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”  These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go to the house of God under the protection of the Mighty One with shouts of joy and praise among the festive throng. Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

V. 1 As pants the hart for cooling streams

When heated in the chase,

So longs my soul, O God, for Thee,

And Thy refreshing grace.

V. 2 For Thee, my God, the living God,

My thirsty soul doth pine:

O when shall I behold Thy face,

Thou Majesty divine?

V. 3 Why restless, why cast down, my soul?

Hope still, and thou shalt sing

The praise of Him who is thy God,

Thy health's eternal spring.

V. 4 To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,

The God whom we adore,

Be glory, as it was, is now,

And shall be evermore.