Happy Child of Grace

A good and popular song in The Sacred Harp is The Child of Grace (77a), arranged by Elisha J. King for The Sacred Harp in 1844. It uses stanzas from a “funeral hymn” by Charles Wesley. Sometimes titled “The Hope of Heaven,” it is the second hymn in Wesley’s Funeral Hymns (2nd volume, London: Strahan, 1759). Wesley’s hymn has eight 8-line stanzas (C.M.D.). The Sacred Harp song uses the first and seventh stanzas of the hymn. Listen HERE for The Child of Grace sung at the fall session of Southwest Texas Sacred Harp Convention in 2012.

1. How happy every child of grace,
Who knows his sins forgiven!
“This earth” he cries, “is not my place,”
“I seek a place in heaven;”
A country far from mortal sight,
Yet O! by faith I see,
The land of rest, the saints’ delight,
A heav’n prepared for me.

2. A stranger in the world below,
I calmly sojourn here,
Nor can its happiness or woe
Provoke my hope or fear:
Its evils in a moment end,
Its joys as soon are past;
But, O! The bliss to which I tend
Eternally shall last.

3. To that Jerusalem above
With singing I repair,
While in the flesh, my hope and love,
My heart and soul are there:
There my exalted Saviour stands,
My merciful high-priest,
And still extends his wounded hands
To take me to his breast.

4. What is there here to court my stay,
To hold me back from home,
While angels beckon me away,
And Jesus bids me come?
Shall I regret my parted friends
Still in the vale confined?
Nay, but whene’er my soul ascends,
They will not stay behind.

5. The race we all are running now,
And if I first attain,
They too their willing head shall bow,
They too the prize shall gain:
Now on the brink of death we stand,
And if I pass before,
They all shall soon escape to land,
And hail me on the shore.

6. Then let me suddenly remove,
That hidden life to share;
I shall not lose my friends above,
But more enjoy them there.
There we in Jesus’ praise shall join,
His boundless love proclaim,
And solemnize in songs divine
The marriage of the Lamb.

7. O what a blessed hope is ours,
While here on earth we stay!
We more than taste the heav’nly powers,
And antedate that day;
We feel the resurrection near,
Our life in Christ concealed;
And with his glorious presence here
Our earthen vessles filled.

8. When he shall more of heav’n bestow,
And bid my soul remove,
And let my trembling spirit go,
To meet the God I love,
With rapt’rous awe on him I’ll gaze,
Who died to set me free,
And shout and wonder at his grace
In vast eternity.