In 1759 Joseph Hart published this text in Hymns Composed on Various Subjects With the Author’s Experience. The first line originally read “Come, ye sinners, poor and wretched” and had seven six-line stanzas bearing the title “Come, and Welcome to Jesus Christ.”

The words of the refrain are from an anonymous hymn that appeared in nineteenth –century hymnbooks. It was based on Jesus’ story of the prodigal son, found in Luke 15:11-32. 

Joseph Hart was born in 1712 in London to Christian parents. He received a liberal education and become a schoolteacher. At first deeply religious, he strayed away and indulged in evil practices. He even wrote and published writings against Christianity and religion of any kind. One pamphlet he wrote was “The Unreasonableness of Religion, Being Remarks and Animadversions on the Rev. John Wesley’s Sermon on Romans 8:32. “ In the end, though, the higher nature triumphed, and he was converted in 1757 in the Moravian Chapel in Fetter Lane, London. He gained a new and clearer view of the sufferings of  Christ, and his heart was changed. It was in the joy of his experience that he wrote this hymn. About the year 1760 he became pastor of the Jewin Street Congregational Chapel, London, and served there until his death on May 24, 1768.

The tune RESTORATION, or ARISE, or I WILL ARISE, is an American folk melody, parts of which have been traced to several secular melodies in England and Ireland. It was immensely popular with the compilers of the southern tune books and appeared in William Walker’s Southern Harmony, 1835, where it was set to a different text. The arrangement is by Melvin West (1930- ; see Biographies).

📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.