Hark! The voice of love and mercy

This hymn, focused on the cross and its wider biblical significance, is rooted in John 19:30, cf stz 3 of the previous one; as in 418, all the Gospels are brought into service. It was published in a 1784 collection of hymns by G Burden, and was written by Jonathan Evans a few years after his conversion under Mr Burden’s ministry and subsequent beginnings as a preacher. Formerly the hymn had been attributed to Benjamin Francis. The 2nd stz, which adds little to the hymn’s substance, is here omitted: ‘It is finished! What assurance/ do the wondrous words afford …’; the rest of the text is the Jubilate version which has added the temple curtain to stz 1 and in 2.4 redrafted ‘death and hell no more shall awe’.

Clearly, any tune must do justice to the repetition in the 5th line; this led the Anglican Hymn Book (1965) and HTC to choose REGENT SQUARE (937) but most hymnals prefer RHUDDLAN as here, which appears also at 950. This fine traditional tune was published in Musical and Poetical and Relicks of the Welsh Bards (2nd edn 1805), edited by Edward Jones. In the 3rd edn (1808) the arrangement is varied considerably. Rhuddlan is an ancient town just S of Rhyl in Denbighshire, N Wales; formerly the tune was called DEWCH I’R FRWYDR (‘Come to the battle’). The hymn proclaims that the great battle is over; see 442. Alan Luff (Welsh Hymns and their Tunes p139) says that the tune ‘dropped out of use in Wales, and has only recently been re-introduced.’ It was EH which, by setting it to Judge eternal, throned in splendour, helped forward its discovery by the English, who lowered the 4th note from A to G (or B flat to A flat). God of grace and God of glory is another hymn which has appropriated this fine tune.

b Coventry, Warwicks (W Midlands) 1748/9, d Foleshill, nr Coventry (W Midlands) 1809. His first job was in a ribbon factory; cf the entries for both Gadsby and Tersteegen. At the age of about 30 he turned from a pleasure-seeking life when he was converted at the W Orchard Chapel in Coventry. The preacher was its pastor George Burden, a hymnwriter, hymn-book editor (1784) and founder member with Haweis (qv) of the London Missionary Soc which came to be led by Congregationalists. When some 4 years later Evans too sensed a call to preach, he obtained a building in nearby Foleshill and began a ministry there in spite of much opposition. The chapel was rebuilt on a larger scale in 1795. His position was formally ratified by his ordination in 1799. He served the Congregational church there for the remaining decade of his life. Some of his hymns first appeared in the Evangelical Magazine; as with many other such writers, one hymn has secured his enduring place in many hymnals. No.419.