1 My dearest Lamb, who bear'st my Grief,
Thy Sympathy affords Relief
To thy poor, drooping Bride:
Thy Blood, as Wine, shall cheer my Heart;
I'll draw my Ease from all thy Smart,
And from thy pierced Side.
2 When thy poor Church grows tir'd and faint,
And, overburden'd, makes Complaint
Of some tremendous Load,
Which sinks her Mind in Heaviness,
And all her inward Pow'rs distress,
As with an absent God.
3 Thou say'st, thou hast been tempted sore,
In ev'ry Point like her, and more;
Witness the shameful Cross:
Now touch'd with ev'ry feeling Sense
Of what can give thy Bride Offence;
Hence she sustains no Loss.
4 If in the Dust she fainting sit,
Washing her loving Saviour's Feet
With her o'erflowing Tears;
Thou gently dost her Spirit raise,
Filling her Heart with Songs of Praise,
And banishing her Fears.
5 Thou canst not see us weep alone,
But Sigh for Sigh, and Groan for Groan,
With us thou bear'st a Part;
Whilst pants the Soul, with throbbing Breast,
With equal Sympathy opprest,
We feel thy loving Heart.
Source: Christian Hymns, Poems, and Spiritual Songs: sacred to the praise of God our Saviour #I.LIII
James Relly was born about 1722 at Jeffreston, Pembrokeshire, Wales, and died in 1778. He was converted to Christianity during the Great Awakening ushered in by George Whitefield. He worked under George Whitefield as a Calvinistic Methodist preacher and missionary. However, Whitefield and Relly separated ways over Relly's seemingly universalist teaching that all humanity was elect (i.e. saved) when Christ took the punishment for all sin when he died. He also departed from both the Calvinists and Methodists by taking the doctrine of Justification further, in teaching that believers no longer sin and the Law's sole purpose is to condemn humanity and point them to Christ.
He was the mentor of John Murray, the founder of the Universalist Ch… Go to person page >
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