There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy (Evangelical Lutheran Worship 588)
1 There’s a wideness in God’s mercy, Like the wideness of the sea;
There’s a kindness in his justice Which is more than liberty
There is no place where earth’s sorrows Are more felt than up in heav’n.
There is no place where earth’s failings Have kindly judgment giv’n.
2 There is a welcome for the sinner, And a promised grace made good;
There is a mercy with the Savior; There is healing in his blood.
There is grace enough for thousands Of new worlds as great as this;
There is room for fresh creations In that upper home of bliss.
3 For the love of God is broader Than the measures of our mind;
And the heart of the eternal Is most wonderfully kind.
There is plentiful redemption In the blood that has been shed;
There is joy for all the members In the sorrows of the head.
4 ‘Tis not all we owe to Jesus; It is something more than all:
Greater good because of evil, Larger mercy through the fall.
If our love were but more simple, We should take him at his word;
And our lives would be all sunshine In the sweetness of the Lord.
Text: Frederick W. Faber; Music: North American; Public Domain
Devotion
Our hymn (as edited for the ELW) invites us to expand our imagination beyond vast pastures or wide oceans. Perhaps in verse 3, lines 3 and 4, this hymn writer was considering the expansion of science in the middle of the 19th century, as naive as that may seem to us in the 21st century. Maybe we can take the images of the earth we again received from beyond the moon. More than that, astro-physics tells us that the universe is expanding faster than our best computations can count. This week’s key question from Psalm 100, how vast God’s creation, and who is included in God’s purview, have been leading us to the limitless grace of the One God. “Uni-verse” should invite us to live and proclaim, through song and word and deed, the one-ness of God’s infinite love and grace.
Prayer
Thank you, O God, for minds that help us study your creation in its smallest details and its ever-expanding horizons. Open our hearts, transform our wills, so that all our relations, with nature and with humanity, may be permeated with your endless love. Amen.