To God On High

Representative Text

1 To God on high be thanks and praise
For mercy ceasing never,
Whereby no foe a hand can raise,
Nor harm can reach us ever;
With joy to Him our hearts ascend,
The source of peace that knows no end,
A peace that none can sever.

2 The honors paid Thy holy name
To hear Thou ever deignest;
Thou, God the Father, still the same
Unshaken ever reignest;
Unmeasured stands Thy glorious might;
Thy thoughts, Thy deeds, outstrip the light;
Thou, Lord, our heav’n remainest.

3 O Jesus Christ, our God and Lord,
Son of Thy heavenly Father,
O Thou who hast our peace restored,
And Thy lost sheep doth gather—
Thou Lamb of God, to Thee on high,
From out our depths we sinners cry,
Have mercy on us, Jesus.

Source: The Bright Array #177

Translator: Robert Singelton

Singleton, Robert C., M.A., was born Oct. 9, 1810, and educated at Trinity College, Dublin; B.A. 1830; M.A. 1833. He was for some time Warden of St. Columba College, near Dublin; and subsequently First Warden of St. Peter's College, Radley, from 1847 to 1851. In 1851 he retired to Monkstown, near Dublin; and then to York, where he died in 1881. In 1868 he published in conjunction with Dr. E. G. Monk, the Anglican Hymn Book (2nd ed. 1871). To that collection he contributed a large number of translations from the Latin, a few from the German, and the following original hymns:— 1. As James the Great, with glowing zeal. St. James. 2. Beneath the fig-tree's grateful shade. St. Bartholomew. 3. From out the deep, 0 Lord, on Thee. For… Go to person page >

Author: Nicolaus Decius

Decius, Nicolaus (Nicolaus a Curia or von Hofe, otherwise Hovesch, seems to have been a native of Hof, in Upper Franconia, Bavaria, and to have been originally called Tech. He became a monk, and was in 1519 Probst of the cloister at Steterburg, near Wolfenbüttel. Becoming favourable to the opinions of Luther, he left Steterburg in July, 1522, and went to Brunswick, where he was appointed a master in the St. Katherine and Egidien School. In 1523 he was invited by the burgesses of Stettin to labour there as an Evangelical preacher along with Paulus von Rhode. He became preacher at the Church of St. Nicholas; was probably instituted by the Town Council in 1526, when von Rhode was instituted to St. Jacob's; and at the visitation in 1535 was re… Go to person page >

Tune

ALLEIN GOTT IN DER HÖH

The tune name ALLEIN GOTT derives from the opening words of Decius's rhymed text in High German. The tune was first published in Schumann's Geistliche Lieder. Decius adapted the tune from a tenth-century Easter chant for the Gloria text, beginning at the part accompanying the words "et in terra pax.…

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[To God on high be thanks and praise] (Lowry)


Timeline

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The Cyber Hymnal #6853
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The Cyber Hymnal #6853

The Baptist Hymnal #88

Include 23 pre-1979 instances
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