Christ My Song - 1500
The purple morning gilds the eastern skies - Morning
(Carl Johann Philipp Spitta/Richard Massie/
Johannes Thomas Rüegg)
Morning.
1. The purple morning gilds the eastern skies,
and what the night had hidden from our eyes
now stands revealed to our admiring gaze;
mountain and valley, wood and fruitful plain,
which in their misty bed asleep had lain,
shine forth and glitter in the sun's bright rays. PDF - Midi
2. Shine in my soul, and light and joy impart,
O blessed Jesus, Sun of my dark heart,
O cause therein the light of truth to shine;
shew me each crooked winding of my heart,
change and renew it so in every part,
that my whole nature be transformed to thine.
3. Lord, in thy light O let me walk this day,
by thy love prompted, act, and speak, and pray,
as a new creature it becomes to do,
whose aim it is, in all his words and ways,
to set forth duly his Creator's praise,
and, new in heart, in life be also new.
4. I pray not, "Take my troubles all away;"
it is for love to bear them that I pray,
and firm belief that all is for my good;
that every trouble must be kindly meant,
since from the hands of him it has been sent,
who is my loving Father and my God.
5. I pray not that my days may smoothly run;
ah no! I pray, "Thy will alone be done!"
Yet give a childlike trusting heart to me;
should the earth seek to draw my spirit down,
O let my heart continue still thine own,
and draw it upward from the earth to thee.
6. I pray not, Lord, that thou wilt quickly end
the griefs and troubles thou art pleased to send;
be thou my peace in every trying hour;
I ask not heaven at once to enter in,
but, ere I die, that I may die to sin;
be thou its death: destroy its guilt and power.
7. Thou Sun, by whom my new life first was lighted,
O let me not again become benighted,
but be my light when shades around me spread;
with the bright splendour of thy heavenly rays
illuminate the evening of my days,
and shed a halo round my dying head.
Richard Massie, Lyra Domestica I, 1863, 6-7.
Translated from the German Im Osten flammt empor der goldne Morgen - Am Morgen
of Carl Johann Philipp Spitta.