My Favorite Non-Wesley Hymn

It is true.  I do sing hymns (and other spiritual songs) not penned by Charles or John Wesley!  When I was to first arrive as pastor at Centenary UMC, last year, I was asked some of my favorite hymns.  Of course, the one in my previous post was at the top of the list, but I also included as my favorite non-Wesley hymn a hymn by Frederick M. Lehman, 1917 (actually, the third stanza comes from Meir Ben Isaac Nehorai, 1050).  - They title of the hymn: The Love of God.

Unfortunately, this hymn does not appear in The United Methodist Hymnal!  Yet, the good folks at Centenary got hold of a Nazarene hymnal, and the choir sang this hymn on my first Sunday!

May God bless you through the words to this hymn.

The Love of God

1. The love of God is greater far

Than tongue or pen can ever tell;

It goes beyond the highest star,

And reaches to the lowest hell.

The guilty pair, bowed down with care,

God gave His Son to win;

His erring child He reconciled,

And pardoned from his sin.

(Refrain) O love of God, how rich and pure!

How measureless and strong!

It shall forevermore endure

The saints' and angels' song!

2. When years of time shall pass away,

And earthly thrones and kingdoms fall,

When men who here refuse to pray,

On rocks and hills and mountains call,

God's love so sure shall still endure,

All measureless and strong;

Redeeming grace to Adam's race

The saints' and angels' song.

3. Could we with ink the ocean fill,

And were the skies of parchment made,

Were ev'ry stalk on earth a quill,

And ev'ry man a scribe by trade,

To write the love of God above

Would drain the ocean dry;

Nor could the scroll contain the whole,

Tho' stretched from sky to sky.