Alfredo Deambrosi

In a service yesterday morning, the congregation sang Charles Wesley’s hymn, “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling.”  As I was singing, I noticed a couple of themes and the connection between them.  While extolling various attributes of God, the hymn seems to be a prayer that God would bring permanent deliverance from anxiety.

The hymnist expresses the problem and the requests.  Without God, souls are “trembling” (line 8), “troubled” (10), and “bent to sinning” (13).  They need deliverance from sin and the anxiety that it brings.  The hymnist makes repeated requests for this deliverance.  In the first stanza, he prays, “Visit us with Thy salvation” (7).  Salvation, of course, communicates the theological truth of justification, but on a more foundational level, it communicates deliverance.  When one is saved from something, he is delivered from it.  The last stanza also uses the term “salvation” (27).  The requests in the second stanza convey more explicitly a desire to be free from anxiety.  He asks, “Let us find that second rest” (12) and “Set our hearts at liberty” (16).  The third stanza uses the word “deliver” explicitly (17).

Wesley connects the theme of permanence to this deliverance from anxiety.  Rather than simply requesting God’s presence, he asks that God “fix” his presence within us (3).  Referring to God in the second stanza as “Alpha and Omega” (14), Wesley reminds us of the eternality of Christ.  The reference is an allusion to Christ’s words in Revelation 1:8, 21:6, and 22:13 and reveals the Christ, who is omnipresent in space and time, to be the first and the last.  In the third stanza, Wesley asks that God “never” leave the souls that he indwells, and he repeats “never” to underscore the need for this enduring deliverance (19-20).  He continues the stanza by describing the Christians’ worship with the terms “always” (21) and “without ceasing” (23).  The final stanza conveys the request for lasting deliverance with a vision of ongoing sanctification until the soul is finally with God in heaven.

When I sing a hymn without much thought, it might seem to be a random collection of prayer requests or theological truths.  Seeing recurring themes in a hymn, however, helps me to sing it as a meaningful prayer.

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Love divine, all loves excelling,
Joy of heaven to earth come down;
Fix in us thy humble dwelling;
All thy faithful mercies crown!
Jesus, Thou art all compassion,
Pure unbounded love Thou art;
Visit us with Thy salvation;
Enter every trembling heart.

Breathe, O breathe Thy loving Spirit,
Into every troubled breast!
Let us all in Thee inherit;
Let us find that second rest.
Take away our bent to sinning;
Alpha and Omega be;
End of faith, as its Beginning,
Set our hearts at liberty.

Come, Almighty to deliver,
Let us all Thy life receive;
Suddenly return and never,
Never more Thy temples leave.
Thee we would be always blessing,
Serve Thee as Thy hosts above,
Pray and praise Thee without ceasing,
Glory in Thy perfect love.

Finish, then, Thy new creation;
Pure and spotless let us be.
Let us see Thy great salvation
Perfectly restored in Thee;
Changed from glory into glory,
Till in heaven we take our place,
Till we cast our crowns before Thee,
Lost in wonder, love, and praise.