Christ My Song - 1556
Tremble not, though darkly gather - Discipline
(Jane Laurie Borthwick/Johannes Thomas Rüegg)
Discipline.
"It is good for me that I have been afflicted;
that I might learn thy statutes." (Psalm 119,71)
1. Tremble not, though darkly gather
clouds and tempests o'er the sky,
still believe, thy heavenly Father
loves thee best when storms are nigh. PDF - Midi
2. When the sun of fortune shineth
long and brightly on the heart,
soon its fruitfulness declineth,
parched and dry in every part.
3. Then the plants of grace have faded
in the dry and burning soil,
thorns and briers their growth have shaded,
earthly cares and earthly toil.
4. But the clouds are seen ascending,
soon the heavens are overcast,
and the weary heart is bending
'neath affliction's stormy blast.
5. Yet the Lord, on high presiding,
rules the storm with powerful hand;
he the shower of grace is guiding
to the dry and barren land.
6. See, at length the clouds are breaking,
tempests have not passed in vain;
for the soul, revived, awaking,
bears its fruit and flowers again.
7. Love divine has seen and counted
every tear it caused to fall,
and the storm which love appointed,
was its choicest gift of all.
H.L.L., alias Jane Laurie Borthwick, Hymns from the Land of Luther, 1862, 28-30.
After a German hymn given there as 'Zage nicht', possibly the beginning
of Johann Wilhelm Reche's Zaget nicht, wenn Dunkelheiten.