O Worship the King Lyrics
1 O worship the King all-glorious above,
O gratefully sing his power and his love:
our shield and defender, the Ancient of Days,
pavilioned in splendor and girded with praise.
2 O tell of his might and sing of his grace,
whose robe is the light, whose canopy space.
His chariots of wrath the deep thunderclouds form,
and dark is his path on the wings of the storm.
3 Your bountiful care, what tongue can recite?
It breathes in the air, it shines in the light;
it streams from the hills, it descends to the plain,
and sweetly distills in the dew and the rain.
4 Frail children of dust, and feeble as frail,
in you do we trust, nor find you to fail.
Your mercies, how tender, how firm to the end,
our Maker, Defender, Redeemer, and Friend!
5 O measureless Might, unchangeable Love,
whom angels delight to worship above!
Your ransomed creation, with glory ablaze,
in true adoration shall sing to your praise!
O Worship the King Hymn History
Robert Grant is the author of O Worship the Lord. It is a paraphrase of Psalm 104.
Grant is reported to have been influenced in writing this song by William Kethe’s paraphrase of Psalm 104 in the Anglo-Genevan Psalter in 1561.
His original paraphrase has gone through various alterations by other people.
Its first appearance was in Edward Bickersteth’s Christian Psalmody in 1833. In the book it had six stanzas of four lines each and did not have music.
The paraphrase of the Psalms was not without controversy in 1800s.
There were people who felt that it was almost close to blasphemy.
I read somewhere that some people would not attend a service where such music was being played.
Nowadays, people are now used to paraphrasing psalms in music.
Robert Grant was born in Bengal India in 1779.
He was Scottish and his father was one of the directors of the famous East India Company.
He was a trained lawyer and was called to the bar in 1807.
Another interesting fact is that Robert Grant was involved in Politics and held positions such as Governor of Bombay and as a member of Parliament at Westminster in the United Kingdom.
For his public services he was knighted in 1834.
His other famous songs include, ‘Savior, when in dust to Thee’ and ‘When gathering clouds around I view’.
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O Worship the King Hymn YouTube Video
Below is a congregation singing, O Worship the King Hymn.