My Love is Ofttimes Low

I’m excited- I've discovered a new song! The latest Getty hit? Nope. Stuart Townend? No, sir. Bethel? Never! It’s an Horatius Bonar and is set nicely to a sixteenth century psalm tune. Progressive Christians will mock my love of things so old; more traditional believers will pity my previous ignorance of so laudable a hymn. I’ve been playing it much and have rejoiced at its meaning. We shall have a version of it tonight during Communion. The verses I embolden below speak to me very strongly; my love for Christ is sometimes as flimsy and changeable as the skies above. Thank God, He changes not, and neither does His cross. Though I am as weak and defective as pharaoh’s staff, He is as strong as the greatest cedar. I challenge you to sing these words without weeping, for I cannot.

I hear the words of love,

I gaze upon the blood,

I see the mighty sacrifice,

And I have peace with God.

’Tis everlasting peace!

Sure as Jehovah’s Name,

’Tis stable as His steadfast throne,

For evermore the same.

The clouds may go and come,

And storms may sweep my sky;

This blood-sealed friendship changes not,

The Cross is ever nigh.

My love is ofttimes low,

My joy still ebbs and flows,

But peace with Him remains the same,

No change my Saviour knows.

I change, He changes not;

The Christ can never die;

His love, not mine, the resting-place,

His truth, not mine, the tie.

The Cross still stands unchanged,

Though heaven is now His home;

The mighty stone is rolled away,

But yonder is His tomb!

And yonder is my peace,

The grave of all my woes!

I know the Son of God has come,

I know He died and rose.

I know He liveth now

At God’s right hand above;

I know the throne on which He sits,

I know His truth and love!