CHRISTIAN LIFE >> LovING SERVICE
SDAH 575
Let your heart be broken for a world in need:
Feed the mouths that hunger, soothe the wounds that bleed,
Give the cup of water and the loaf of bread
Be the hands of Jesus, serving in His stead.
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For Worship Leaders
Make each hymn more meaningful with these helpful tools: Short, ready-to-use hymn introductions for church bulletins, multiple ways to introduce a hymn based on your worship theme and in-depth history and insights to enrich your song service.
📖 Reference: Feel free to share but please cite hymnsforworship.org when reproducing.
Introductions for Sabbath School Song Service (based on specific lesson quarterlies):
Bryan Jeffery Leech (1931-; see SDAH 270), a minister of the Evangelical Covenant Church of America, wrote from his home in Santa Barbara, California: “[It] has the tune name BJORKLUND because Clifford Bjorklund, the secretary of our denomination, commissioned me to write a hymn for World Relief Sunday. At first all I could think of was the terrible plight of the needy people, of starving bodies and the ravages of drought, which did not seem suitable subjects for a hymn. And then I thought of what our reaction to such things should be, and immediately the recurring idea of ‘Let Your Heart Be Broken’ was born.”
It was printed by the Hymn Society of America in The Hymn, April 1976, and in that same year in the hymnal edited by Leech and Fred Bock, Hymns for the Family of God. There the tune bears the name BJORKLUND MAJOR, because it is presented in the key of D major instead of the original D minor. It also has one melody change at the end of line three, but the SDAH committee elected to use the composer’s original version.
Especially challenging, as we think of our responsibility toward the needs of the world around us, is Leech’s phrase in the fourth stanza: “In the world’s great trouble, risk yourself for God.”
📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.
Text
1
Let your heart be broken for a world in need:
Feed the mouths that hunger, soothe the wounds that bleed,
Give the cup of water and the loaf of bread
Be the hands of Jesus, serving in His stead.
2
Here on earth applying principles of love,
Visible expression – God still rules above
Living illustration of the Living Word
To the minds of all who’ve Never seen or heard.
3
Blest to be a blessing privileged to care,
Challenged by the need apparent everywhere.
Where mankind is wanting, fill the vacant place.
Be the means through which the Lord reveals His grace.
4
Add to your believing deeds that prove it true,
Knowing Christ as Savior, make Him Master, too.
Follow in His footsteps, go where He has trod;
In the world’s great trouble risk yourself for God.
5
Let your heart be tender and your vision clear;
See mankind as God sees, serve Him far and near.
Let your heart be broken by a brother’s pain;
Share your rich resources, give and give again.
Hymn Info
Biblical Reference
(a) Matt 25:40, 10:42 (c) Matt 5:16; John 13:13
Author
Bryan Jeffery Leech (1931-)
Year Published
1975
Performance Suggestions
Unison
Copyright
Copyright 1975 and commissioned by the Evangelical Covenant Church of America. Used by permission.
Hymn Tune
BJORKLUND
Metrical Number
6.5.6.5.D.
Composer
Bryan Jeffery Leech
