What Wondrous Love Is This

This week we return to reflections on older songs, as we look at the hymn that will be our anthem this week. Our song, “What Wondrous Love Is This,” comes from an early 19th century shaped-note collection called Southern Harmony, and Music Companion (1835). William "Singin' Billy" Walker was the primary compiler of this collection which included over 300 songs. It became one of the most influential tunebooks in US history, and perhaps the best seller. Walker collected tunes and texts from a variety of well-known hymnwriters, including Watts, Wesley, and Newton, as well as indigenous sources. It is from the latter sources that we get tunes for songs like “What Wondrous Love Is This.”

Like Keith and Kristyn Getty (see last week’s post), Walker was interested in reaching a multi-generational audience. In the preface to the original edition of Southern Harmony, Walker states his intentions: “Those that are partial to ancient music, will find here some good old acquaintances which will cause them to remember with pleasure the scenes of life that are past and gone; while my youthful companions, who are more fond of modern music, I hope will find a sufficient number of new tunes to satisfy them, as I have spared no pains in trying to select such tunes as would meet the wishes of the public.”

The text of “What Wondrous Love Is This,” from an anonymous Appalachian folk hymn, bears a quality familiar to readers of the Psalms. In the hymn, the singer addresses his or her own soul; David and the other psalmists were never too proud to talk to themselves. There are particular echoes to Psalm 43, where the psalmist sings, “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God” (v. 5).

In the hymn, we remind our soul of God’s action of love in Christ to bear our curse of sin and to rescue us from our dismal fate:

What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this that caused the Lord of bliss
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul,
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul.

When I was sinking down, sinking down, sinking down,
When I was sinking down, sinking down,
When I was sinking down beneath God’s righteous frown,
Christ laid aside His crown for my soul, for my soul,
Christ laid aside His crown for my soul.

The hymn also declares the intention of the believer, overcome by such a great salvation, to join the eternal song of the great "cloud of witnesses" in praise of God, a song that will not be stilled by death; rather, a song that will only become deeper, richer and more resonant in the halls of heaven:

To God and to the Lamb, I will sing, I will sing;
To God and to the Lamb, I will sing.
To God and to the Lamb Who is the great “I Am”;
While millions join the theme, I will sing, I will sing;
While millions join the theme, I will sing.

And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on;
And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on.
And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing and joyful be;
And through eternity, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on;
And through eternity, I’ll sing on.

Sing on!