I Cannot Tell

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I am a sucker for a good hymn; I always have been.  So, when I come across something new, I have a tendency to share it with all my friends and try to find any excuse to work it into a worship service.  That very thing happened this last Sunday.  

One of the joys and challenges of serving a church in a different (even if sister) denomination is singing from a different hymnal. Often during Sunday services I am hoping that I will know at least one or two of our five hymns, or at least the melody.  It doesn't always happen. What does happen is that every once in a while, we will sing something that I completely fall in love with.

The hymn in question is titled I Cannot Tell Why He Whom Angels Worship.  Not the easiest mouthful, but it is to the beautiful tune Londonderry Air (the tune to O Danny Boy).  As we sang it, I was taken not only by the gorgeous melody, but by the striking lyrics.  Each verse begins with the admission that we don't know God's ways, but with the rising strains of the second half of the verse we proclaim what we do know: that the Savior of the world is here.

Below are the lyrics as printed in The Irish Presbyterian Hymnbook, followed by a video of two of the verses from a cathedral in Belfast.  I hope you enjoy this as much as I do!

I Cannot Tell Why He Whom Angels Worship
Tune: LONDONDERRY AIR

I cannot tell why He whom angels worship
should set His love upon the sons of men;
or why as shepherd He should seek the wanderers,
to bring them back; they know not how nor when.
But this I know, that He was born of Mary
when Bethlehem's manger was His only home,
and that He lived at Nazareth and laboured;
and so the Saviour, Saviour of the world has come.

I cannot tell how silently He suffered
as with His peace He graced this place of tears;
nor how His heart upon the cross was broken,
the crown of pain to three and thirty years.
But this I know, He heals the broken-hearted
and stays our sin and calms our lurking fear,
and lifts the burden from the heavy-laden;
for still the Saviour, Saviour of the world, is here.

I cannot tell how He will win the nations,
how He will claim His earthly heritage,
how satisfy the needs and aspirations
of east and west, of sinner and of sage.
But this I know, all flesh shall see His glory,
and He shall reap the harvest He has sown,
and some glad day His sun will shine in splendour
when He the Saviour, Saviour of the world, is known.

I cannot tell how all the lands shall worship,
when at His bidding every storm is stilled;
or who can say how great the jubilation
when all our hearts with love for Him are filled.
But this I know, the skies will sound his praises,
ten thousand thousand human voices sing,
and earth to heaven, and heaven to earth will answer:
'At last the Saviour, Saviour of the world, is King!'

Text from Hymn 648 in The Irish Presbyterian Hymnal
Written by William Young Fullerton, 1857-1932