St Luke's Church Eccleshill

Hark! All creation stands

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Hark! All creation stands in awe

Hark! All creation stands in awe!
The angel-hosts adore.
To earth has come a king
unlike all human kings before.
Come, join the throng,
behold his majesty.
Come, add your joyful song
and bow your knee.

Jesus, the saviour we revere,
was born within our sphere.
He died for human sin:
in him the love of God is near.
We rise to shout,
good news we will proclaim.
No fortress can hold out,
against his reign.

Bow then before his holy throne,
and worship him alone.
He seeks the open heart
in which to make his mercies known.
He can transform,
give love instead of hate:
so come, in him be born,
and celebrate.

Story behind the song

I wrote this hymn for the Settle Methodist Circuit's Eighth Annual Hymn Festival in November 2007, for which there was a competition to write a tune to be named "Charles Wesley" (as 2007 is the year of the 300th anniversary of his birth - he was born in 1707).

As Charles Wesley didn't write tunes, I couldn't draw my inspiration from his music - so I decided that in order to write a fitting tune, I had to have words. I first considered whether to write a new tune to one of his hymns ... but the problem with that is that most of his well-known hymns have well-known tunes with them which serve their purposes and are familiar. So I decided to write some words "in the style of" Charles Wesley.

At a lecture of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland it was said that "in contrast to Isaac Watts who was concerned to declare doctrinal praise of God, Wesley always wanted to move from doctrine to the heart of worship, which is the personal encounter of Christ with the human heart, and to express its emotion as well as its effect on the will." (Or words to that effect - I didn't write it down quickly enough.)

I felt I had to start with "Hark!", as one of Wesley's best-known hymns starts that way (in fact it wasn't originally "Hark! The herald angels sing" but "Hark! How all the welkin rings". I first wondered about writing "Hark! All creation stands in awe / in heaven an open door" (referring to the vision in Revelation 4 and writing an Advent hymn), but eventually I settled on Christmas instead and wrote of the angels. And several other phrases from Wesley came to mind - but I wanted particularly to come to the heart of the gospel in verse 2 and to express it both in terms of atonement ("he died for human sin") but above all in terms of God's love for us. And then in verse 3 I wanted to move to the response that God seeks - the open heart in which he can dwell by faith.

As for the tune, I wanted to begin with a fanfare. I've always loved bass lines which proceed in steps and which maintain a solid tuba-like movement. I wanted to keep the impetus at the ends of lines and lead each line into the next. I wanted the melody to range from the depths to the heights, and to acknowledge deep places in the middle points (lines 2 and 6), while hitting a triumphant high in the fifth line and then return to a climax at the end - rising and falling a little like telegraph poles stretched between wires. There is, of course, no tune which does everything, but these were some of the aspects of Wesley's character that I wanted to explore in a tune which might be worthy of his name.

In the event, the tune was placed runner-up in the "open" class of the competition, and I got the chance to attend one of the events at St John's Methodist Church, Settle, on Friday 9th November 2007. After the service finished I sang the hymn to the assembled congregation.

John Hartley.