These words are a paraphrase by Philip Doddridge of three verses in the New Testament: Luke 12:35-37. There is one omitted stanza.

The hymn appears in Job Orton’s Hymns Founded on Various Texts in the Holy Scriptures, published in 1755 after Doddridge’s death and containing most of his hymns. It was Doddridge’s common practice to write a hymn that contained the main thought or a summary of his sermon, and then have the congregation sing it as a closing hymn. In those days when many people were illiterate, hymns were sung by the “lining-out” method. A reader would read out the first line of a stanza, and then the congregation would sing it. Then he would read out the second line, which would be sung, and so on, line by line. While this may seem to destroy the continuity of thought, when done properly it is quite rhythmic. It did enable those who could not read to join in the singing of a hymn, new or old, and the words would reinforce the sermon that had just been delivered.

Born in London on June 26, 1702, Philip Doddridge was a weak and sickly child, the twentieth in the family. His mother was the daughter of a Lutheran minister who had fled from Bohemia to England because of religious persecution, and she brought Philip up as a Nonconformist. His father was the son of a Church of England clergyman who had resigned his living rather than subscribe to the Act of Uniformity, which required obedience to the Anglican prayer book in its entirety.

While still a child, Doddridge lost both his parents and was cared for by friends. He showed signs of academic ability and religious devotion, and was therefore offered an education to train for the Anglican ministry. However, the university statutes, which required acceptance of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Anglican faith, were unacceptable to his inbred and cultivated Independent-or Congregational-theological principles. So he declined the offer and trained instead at Kibworth in Leicestershire for the ministry of the Independent Church. In 1723 he completed the course and succeeded his teacher, Jennings, at Kibworth. Six years later he was chosen to conduct a new academy being established at Market Harborough, but he was transferred in the same year to Northampton. He was appointed to the Castle Hill church and directed the theological seminary for 22 years, training many other young men in philosophy and theology for the Congregational ministry. The University of Aberdeen awarded him the honorary D.D. degree in 1736. His health was never very good, and in 1751 he was persuaded to make a journey to Lisbon to find a cure, but he died there of tuberculosis on October 26, 1751. He was cofounder of the hospital in Northampton. In that town there stands to his memory the Doddridge Memorial Chapel. He wrote almost 400 hymns, most of them based on his sincere, practical sermons. He also wrote SDAH 611, “Awake, My Soul!”

GARELOCHSIDE, first published in Christian Praise (1957), was composed by Kenneth George Finlay. Born February 3, 1882, in Marylebone, Middlesex, England, the son of an Aberdeen University professor, he was educated there and later at Edinburgh. A naval architect, he held responsible positions in shipbuilding before deciding in 1928 to devote himself to music. He studied under Ralph Vaughan Williams (see Biographies) at the Royal College of Music for one year, and then another year in Glasgow, Scotland. From 1930 to 1947 he was a teacher of class singing at the Royal Academy at Irvine in Ayrshire. Finlay wrote about 40 hymn tunes, two cantatas, part songs, and choral and instrumental pieces. He retired in 1947 to Kent to be with his sister, eventually moving to Glasgow, in 1957, where he died at age 92 on April 15, 1974. The tune name recalls scenery he must have been familiar with, for Gareloch is an inlet of the Firth of Clyde, less than 28 miles from Glasgow. One distinctive feature of the tune is its almost complete descending octave in the final phrase.

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