A song breaks from our hearts

Authors:
Themes:
Scriptures:
  • Psalms 117
  • Psalms 17:15
  • Isaiah 53:11
  • Matthew 8:11
  • Luke 13:29
  • John 3:5-8
  • Acts 2:23
  • Romans 8:11
  • 2 Corinthians 5:17-19
  • Ephesians 2:13-16
  • Hebrews 12:2
  • 1 Peter 1:8-9
  • 1 Peter 2:24
  • Revelation 1:7
  • Revelation 21:4
  • Revelation 22:4-5
  • Revelation 5:6-14
  • Revelation 7:9-17
Book Number:
  • 167

A song breaks from our hearts
as we see the Saviour’s face;
the griefs of earth are gone for ever
as we enter in redeemed and new
to the kingdom of God’s grace.

2. Unnumbered people here
gathered from earth’s farthest ends;
born of the Spirit from all nations,
joyful to be one in God’s great love,
reconciled in Christ as friends.

3. Our worship fills the air
as we look upon his wounds;
all heaven falls before Christ Jesus,
he who bore the cross, our sin and shame,
who is conqueror of the tomb.

4. The Father’s plans fulfilled,
now his heart is satisfied
to see his Son engulfed in praises
for his worth, his love, his power, his name
can no longer be denied.

5. Unbounded joy has come
to those long in sorrow held;
the Saviour smiles upon his children
and the Spirit reigns, all hurts are healed
and our grandest dreams excelled.

6. O by such hopes of heaven
and the love that draws us in
inspire us, Lord, to love and worship
that the church may be a foretaste here
of your new world to begin.

© Author/Praise Trust
John Benton

Approaching God - Adoration and Thanksgiving

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Tune

The story behind the hymn

While editing the monthly Evangelicals Now, John Benton introduced a regular slot for ‘New Music’. Some items in the present book had their first outing there, including this joyful and forward-looking hymn (text and tune) which was one of several contributed by the editor himself. He wrote it while on holiday in Downderry on the S coast of Cornwall in 1989, and it was sung at Chertsey Street Baptist Church, Guildford, in the following year. Brian Wren has written of the ‘inner necessity’ which moves Christians to sing (as well as our biblical directives) and this is a fresh and explicit example of such Christ-centred compulsion. A SONG BREAKS was composed with the words, and together they comprise the author/composer’s first entry in a hymn book. Margaret Ellis’ arrangement was made for Praise!

A look at the author

Benton, John Edward

b Isleworth, Middlesex 1949. Southall Grammar Sch and Univ of Sussex (PhD). A journalist and minister of the gospel in the Grace Baptist tradition, he produced with Bill Bygroves in 1979 a collection, Scripture Songs, for Belvidere Road Ch, Liverpool. He is currently pastor of Chertsey St Baptist Church near the centre of Guildford, Surrey, which completed a major building enlargement project in 2005; he has combined this with the job of assistant editor, then editor (from 1993) of the monthly Evangelicals Now. Another occasional contributor is his wife Ann. This journal has regularly promoted new words and music by publishing songs and hymns as well as the monthly series ‘Hymns Now’ (2000–03), ‘The Music Exchange’ (2004 onwards), ‘Beating Time’ and other features, as well as arranging music-related events in partnership with churches. In addition to his occasional book and film reviews and main feature articles, the Editor also provides ‘The Commentary’, a regular 500-word summary of a current issue seen from a biblical perspective. His booklet on Evangelistic Calvinism: why the doctrines of the grace of God are good news was published in 2006. No.167.