Favorite Hymns 1

A friend asks:

“You posted your favorite secular song, but what about your favorite Christian songs?  We have never heard which hymns or psalms are your favorite.  So I have a few questions for you.  Answer if you dare.  First, which is your favorite hymn that we do not sing in the Canadian Reformed Churches?”

Good question. And it is actually quite easy to answer. My favorite hymn, which is not in the Canadian Reformed Book of Praise, is Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing.  Although I am sure my favorite will change in the future, I certain do appreciate this hymn. It speaks of our unworthiness before God, and his great mercy and love in spite of us. The verse that speaks of us being “prone to wander” echos in my soul because I am…I am prone to wander. Take my heart oh God, take and seal it! Below are the lyrics and a version by Sufjan Stevens.  Feel free to sing along.

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount, I’m fixed upon it
Mount of Thy unchanging love

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Here there by Thy great help I’ve come
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wandering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be
Let that grace now, like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount, I’m fixed upon it
Mount of Thy unchanging love