Great God, as seasons disappear

Representative Text

1 Great God, as seasons disappear,
And changes mark the rolling year,
As time with rapid pinions flies,
May every season make us wise.

2 Long has thy favor crowned our days,
And summer shed again its rays;
No deadly cloud our sky has vailed;
No blasting winds our path assailed.

3 Our harvest months have o'er us rolled,
And filled our fields with waving gold;
Our tables spread, our garners stored!
Where are our hearts to praise the Lord?

4 The solemn harvest comes apace,
The closing day of life and grace:
Time of decision, awful hour!
Around it let no tempests lower!

5 Prepare us, Lord, by grace divine,
Like stars in heaven to rise and shine;
Then shall our happy souls above
Reap the full harvest of thy love!

Source: The Voice of Praise: a collection of hymns for the use of the Methodist Church #980

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Author: Edmund Butcher

Butcher, Edmund, born at Colchester, Essex, in 1757, and brought up as a linen-draper. After undergoing a preliminary training for the Unitarian Ministry, he was appointed to the charge of Leather Lane Chapel, Holborn, in 1789. From thence he removed to Sidbury Vale, Sidmouth, in 1798. Died April 14, 1822. Memoir in the Christian Moderator, 1827. His works include Picture of Sidmouth; Tour through various parts of England; Sermons, to which are added suitable Hymns, 1798; and the Substance of the Holy Scriptures Methodized, 1801. His hymns were given in the two latter works, in the Protestant Dissenters’ Magazine (of which he was some time editor); in Kippis's Collection, 1795; the Christian Guardian, 1802-1808; Aspland's Selection, 1810… Go to person page >

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First Line:	Great God, as seasons disappear
Author:	Edmund Butcher
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

Jeremiah 8:20
(hymns)

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Notes

Great God, as seasons disappear. E. Butcher. [Harvest.] This hymn is adapted to Sermon xvi., in 6 stanzas of 4 lines, in his Sermons to which are added suitable Hymns, 1798. It is found in two forms, the first chiefly in the Nonconformist collections, including Baptist Psalms and Hymns, 1858; Spurgeon's Our Own Hymn Book, 1866, No. 1033, and others; and the second in several hymn-books in the Church of England. The text in the latter, as found in Bp. Bickersteth's Psalms & Hymns, 1858; Harland's Church Psalter, &c, is much altered, and dates from Bickersteth's Christian Psalmody, 1833.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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