The Cyber Hymnal ‎#1050

1050. Conflicting Feelings

1. Strange and mysterious is my life.
What opposites I feel within!
A stable peace, a constant strife;
The rule of grace, the power of sin:
Too often I am captive led,
Yet daily triumph in my Head,
Yet daily triumph in my Head.

2. I prize the privilege of prayer,
But oh! what backwardness to pray!
Though on the Lord I cast my care,
I feel its burden every day;
I seek His will in all I do,
Yet find my own is working too,
Yet find my own is working too.

3. I call the promises my own,
And prize them more than mines of gold;
Yet though their sweetness I have known,
They leave me unimpressed and cold
One hour upon the truth I feed,
The next I know not what I read,
The next I know not what I read.

4. I love the holy day of rest,
When Jesus meets His gathered saints;
Sweet day, of all the week the best!
For its return my spirit pants:
Yet often, through my unbelief,
It proves a day of guilt and grief,
It proves a day of guilt and grief.

5. While on my Savior I rely,
I know my foes shall lose their aim,
And therefore dare their power defy,
Assured of conquest through His name,
But soon my confidence is slain,
And all my fears return again,
And all my fears return again.

6. Thus different powers within me strive,
And grace and sin by turns prevail;
I grieve, rejoice, decline, revive,
And victory hangs in doubtful scale:
But Jesus has His promise passed,
That grace shall overcome at last,
That grace shall overcome at last.

Text Information

• First Line: Strange and mysterious is my life
• Title: Conflicting Feelings
• Author: John Newton (1779)
• Meter: LM refrain
• Language: English
• Source: Olney Hymns (London: W. Oliver, 1779), number 130; Appeared with Bradbury's music in The Devotional Hymn and Tune Book, 1864
• Copyright: Public Domain

Tune Information

• Name: SOLID ROCK
• Composer: William Batchelder Bradbury (1863)
• Meter: LM refrain
• Incipit: 51353 32234 44217
• Key: F Major
• Copyright: Public Domain