The tune for this hymn, RHOSYMEDRE, is named for the village where John D. Edwards, the composer, served as vicar for the last twelve years of his life.
My song is love unknown, my Savior’s love to me;
love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be.
O who am I, that for my sake, my Lord should take frail flesh and die?
He came from His blest throne salvation to bestow;
but man made strange, and none the longed-for Christ would know.
But oh, my Friend, my Friend indeed, who at my need His life did spend!
Sometimes they strew His way and His sweet praises sing;
resounding all the way hosannas to their King.
Then “Crucify!” is all their breath, and for His death they thirst and cry.
Why, what hath my Lord done? What makes this rage and spite?
He made the lame to run, He gave the blind their sight.
Sweet injuries! Yet they at these themselves displease, and ‘gainst Him rise.
They rise, and needs will have my dear Lord made away;
a murderer they save, the Prince of Life they slay.
Yet cheerful He to suffering goes, that He His foes from thence might free.
In life, no house, no home my Lord on earth might have;
in death, no friendly tomb but what a stranger gave.
What may I say? Heav’n was His home, but mine the tomb wherein He lay.
Here might I stay and sing, no story so divine;
never was love, dear King, never was grief like Thine.
This is my Friend, in whose sweet praise I all my days could gladly spend.
Hymn tune: RHOSYMEDRE
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