My Soul, How Lovely Is the Place

My soul

how love­ly is the place

To which thy God re­sorts!

’Tis Heav’n to see His smil­ing face

Though in His earth­ly courts.

There the great Mon­arch of the skies

His sav­ing pow­er dis­plays

And light breaks in up­on our eyes

With kind and quick­en­ing rays.

With His rich gifts the heav’n­ly Dove

Descends and fills the place

While Christ re­veals His won­drous love

And sheds abroad His grace.

There

migh­ty God

Thy words de­clare

The se­crets of Thy will;

And still we seek Thy mer­cy there

And sing Thy prais­es still.

My heart and flesh cry out for Thee

While far from Thine ab­ode;

When shall I tread Thy courts

and see

My Sav­ior and my God?

The spar­row builds her­self a nest

And suf­fers no remove;

O make me

like the spar­rows

blest

To dwell but where I love.

To sit one day be­neath Thine eye

And hear Thy gra­cious voice

Exceeds a whole eter­ni­ty

Employed in car­nal joys.

Lord

at Thy thresh­old I would wait

While Je­sus is with­in

Rather than fill a throne of state

Or live in tents of sin.

Could I com­mand the spa­cious land

And the more bound­less sea

For one blest hour at Thy right hand

I’d give them both away.