GOD THE FATHER >> Love of God
SDAH 77
O love of God most full,
O love of God most free,
Come warm my heart, come fill my soul,
Come lead me unto Thee.
Text
1
O love of God most full,
O love of God most free,
Come warm my heart, come fill my soul,
Come lead me unto Thee.
2
Warm as the glowing sun
So shines Thy love on me,
It wraps me ‘round with kindly care,
It draws me unto Thee.
3
The wildest sea is calm,
The tempest brings no fear,
The darkest night is full of light,
Because Thy love is near.
4
O love of God most full,
O love of God most free,
It warms my heart, it fills my soul,
With might it strengthens me.
Hymn Info
Biblical Reference
(c) 1 John 4:18
Author
Oscar Clute (1837-1902)
Copyright
Copyright 1963 by Pro Art Publications. Reprinted by permission of Belwin-Mills Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.
Hymn Tune
VANDEMAN
Metrical Number
S.M.
Tune Source
from an anthem by Gordon Young (1919-1998) / 1963
Theme
LOVE OF GOD
Get the hymn sheet in other keys here
Notes
Get to know the hymns a little deeper with the SDA Hymnal Companion. Use our song leader’s notes to engage your congregation in singing with understanding. Even better, involve kids in learning this hymn with our homeschooling materials.
Jesus Christ Himself experienced suffering and shame. The leaders also mocked Him and cursed Him. But despite all this, God’s unmeasurable love to His people led Him through and made it possible for us to be in harmony with with. (Lesson 10, 1st Quarter 2021 -Sunday, Isaiah’s Testing Truth, 2/28/2021)
This hymn has been characterized as “a rhapsody of gratitude for the love of God.” It first appeared in three eight-line stanza in Pilgrim Hymnal, 1904, and has since been shortened by editors, and altered somewhat to change archaic language.
Oscar Clute was born March 11, 1837, in Bethlehem, New York; he graduated from Michigan Agricultural College, staying there to teach mathematics for several years. Feeling a call to the ministry, he studied at Meadville Theological Seminary and for 20 years was pastor of Unitarian churches in New Jersey, Iowa, and California. In his later life, he was a successful college president of Michigan Agricultural College (now Michigan State), and Florida Agricultural College. At a time when scientific theories seemed to threaten men’s loyalties to spiritual things, Clute, with his scientific knowledge and deep religious convictions, had a great influence for good. He exhibited a lifelong interest in the entrance of woman into the ministry. After five years of retirement in California, he died January January 27, 1902.
Gordon Young is recognized as one of the most brilliant organist and prolific composers or organa and choral music of our times, having more than 800 compositions appearing in the catalog of some 40 American and British publishers. His anthems and organ works are performed weekly in churches from coast to coast. Born October 15, 1919, in McPherson, Kansas, he graduated from Southwestern College, Winfield, Kansas, and went to Curtis Institute of Music, Philadelphia. Later organ study was with Joseph Bonnet in Paris and American organist Alexander McCurdy. He has served as organist-choirmaster in large churches in Philadelphia, Kansas City, and Detroit, Michigan, and continues to write music that is a blessing to Christians all over the world. An honorary D.Mus. was conferred on him by Southwestern College.
While minister of music at Vallejo Drive Seventh-day Adventist Church, Glendale, California, in the 1960s, Wayne Hooper (1920- ;see Biographies) used and enjoyed Young’s anthem, “O Love of God Most Full” (unfortunately, now out of print.) Wanting to have this beautiful, simple melody in SDAH, he asked for and received permission from Young to condense the anthem into a hymn of two scores. When asked to name his tune, Gordon Young wrote: “I enjoy hearing George Vandeman on television [the It is Written program], so why not name the tune VANDEMAN?”
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