The following post contain the words of a hymn written by an African pastor, Emmanuel T. Sibomana.  He was a Baptist pastor born around 1915.  He was born and lived near Musema in central Burundi.  He published this hymn in 1946 and it was translated into English by a missionary in Rwanda, Rosemary Guillebaud.  He went home to be with the Lord in 1975.  The words of this hymn are taken from Sinclair B. Ferguson’s book By Grace Alone; How the Grace of God Amazes Me (Reformation Trust Publishing, 2010).  Each of the seven chapters in Dr. Ferguson’s book are reflections on divine grace, each built around a stanza from this hymn.  I thought you would be blessed by the words of this hymn.

 

O how the grace of God

Amazes me!

It loosed me from my bonds

And set me free!

What made it happen so?

His own will, this much I know,

Set me, as now I show,

At liberty.

–

My God has chosen me,

Though one of nought,

To sit beside my King,

In heaven’s court.

Hear what my Lord has done

O, the love that made him run

To meet his erring son!

This has God wrought.

–

Not for my righteousness,

For I have none,

But for his mercy’s sake,

Jesus, God’s Son,

Suffered on Calvary’s tree-

Crucified with thieves was he-

Great was his grace to me,

His wayward one.

–

And when I think of how,

At Calvary,

He bore sin’s penalty

Instead of me,

Amazed, I wonder why

He, the sinless One, should die

For one so vile as I;

My Saviour he!

–

Now all my heart’s desire

Is to abide

In him, my Saviour dear,

In him to hide.

My shield and buckler he,

Covering and protecting me;

From Satan’s darts I’ll be

Safe at his side.

–

Lord Jesus, hear my prayer,

Your grace impart;

When evil thoughts arise

Through Satan’s art,

O, drive them all away

And do you, from day to day,

Keep me beneath your sway,

King of my heart.

–

Come now, the whole of me,

Eyes, ears, and voice.

Join me, creation all,

With joyful noise:

Praise him who broke the chain

Holding me in sin’s domain

And set me free again!

Sing and rejoice!