Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church ‎#65

65. Wide open are Thy hands

1 Wide open are Thy hands,
Paying with more than gold
The awful debt of guilty men,
Forever and of old.
Ah, let me grasp those hands,
That we may never part,
And let the power of their blood
Sustain my fainting heart.

2 Wide open are Thine arms,
A fallen world to embrace;
To take to love and endless rest
Our whole forsaken race.
Lord, I am sad and poor,
But boundless is Thy grace;
Give me the soul-transforming joy
For which I seek Thy face.

3 Draw all my mind and heart
Up to Thy throne on high,
And let Thy sacred Cross exalt
My spirit to the sky.
To these, Thy mighty hands,
My spirit I resign;
Living, I live alone to Thee,
Dying, alone am Thine.

Amen.

Text Information

• First Line: Wide open are Thy hands
• Author: Bernard of Clairvaux (?), d. 1153
• Translator: Charles Porterfield Krauth (1870. a)
• Meter: S. M. D.
• Language: English
• Publication Date: 1917
• Topic: The Church Year: Lent

Tune Information

• Name: SALVE JESU
• Composer: Harold Lewars (1914)
• Meter: S. M. D.
• Key: d minor