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This hymn exhorts us to obey the countless commands in Scripture, especially in the Psalms, to praise the Lord. After reminding us of the reasons we have to praise Him - His holiness, love, greatness, noble deeds, and matchless power, it joins with Psalm 150 in calling for praise from instruments and all the creatures of the world. May God's praise continue to rise from His people as they join the witness of all creation in proclaiming God's honor and worth.
This song was born out of the author's own experience of the love of God. The Bible portrays the love God has for people using just about every human relationship as an analogy. This is because God's love is so far above man's love that every earthly experience of love shows us just a sliver of the way God loves us. One of the most powerful experiences of love we can have in this world is romantic love - the love a husband and wife share for each other. God uses this analogy for the way in which He loves us throughout the Bible, but perhaps nowhere as pointedly (and explicitly) as the book of Song of Solomon. In 6:3 the wife proclaims to her husband "I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine," a picture of the intimacy Christians can experience with Jesus. This song tells the love story of God with His people - how He sought them out when they had rebelled and were filthy (Ezekiel 16), washed them and made them beautiful with His own beauty, and then grants that they might treasure Him and anticipate His return.
This is a song about the exceeding beauty of Jesus. Though we cannot see Jesus, we know Him to be beautiful both by our knowledge of His character and works in Scripture, and by our experiential knowledge of Him. As we say today, He is a “beautiful person.” Why is He beautiful? Stennett reminds us in this hymn text that Jesus’ beauty was most clearly demonstrated to us at the cross. By referring to His brow Stennett juxtaposes both the images of a majestic coronation and the picture of the crown of thorns being placed upon Jesus’ head in jest. While on the cross Jesus’ lips overflowed with grace as He prayed for the very ones who crucified Him. Jesus demonstrated grace and love far beyond anything we can know or experience “among the sons of men.” And Philippians 2 shows us that Jesus’ humiliation and suffering serve to further glorify His great beauty: “although [Jesus] existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name.” As the last verse encourages us, let us not only enjoy “regarding the wonders of His grace” but tell others of His beauty that they might love Him and join our songs of praise.
Jesus called God’s command to “love the LORD [our] God with all [our] heart and with all [our] soul and with all [our] might” (Deuteronomy 6:5) the “greatest commandment” since all of the aspects of the law, including our duties to God and fellow man, stand or fall on the depth of our love to them. The depth of the love that God requires and deserves is staggering. The Pentateuch records the elaborate duties that God gave to His people that were to be an expression of their love for Him. And those rituals are indicative of an even more pervasive, all-of-life, kind of spiritual service that God requires of us. Horatius Bonar understood this love and desired to give all of himself, including His heart, to God. But he also realized that our hearts are naturally deceitful and desperately sick (Jeremiah 17:9) and incapable of loving God on our own. We naturally orient our lives around, find security and satisfaction in, and spend our time thinking about the things of this world. We were made to be satisfied in the only truly satisfying object of our love – God Himself. This song is plea, both with our hearts to leave the empty things of this world, and with God who alone has the power to draw out our affections to drink from His “fountain of delights.” (Psalm 36:8)
This song expresses the intimate love that is possible between a Christian and the Lord Jesus. The culminating desire of a love this deep is to be joined together with our Lord when we finally depart from this world and go home to be with Him in heaven. The Bible portrays believers as the bride of Christ in the final chapters of Revelation. Husbands are exhorted to "love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her." (Ephesians 5:25) The most intimate love possible in this world, marriage, is but a picture of the love that can and will exist between Jesus and His people. So it is right and fitting to sing such intimate and tender lyrics like "seal me upon Your arm, and wear that pledge of love forever there" (v. 1) and "but I am jealous of my heart, lest it should once from You depart" (v. 3). May songs like this help us feel love for Jesus, a love that is better even than romantic love.
"I Sing the Mighty Power of God" is one of the most beautiful hymns we have that describes God's glory and power displayed to us in creation. Romans 1:20 (NASB) says "since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made." God has displayed ample evidence of his nature and his power so that unbelieving people are without excuse. In fact, creation speaks so loudly of a creator that men often end up worshiping the creation (Rom 1:23). Meditating on God's goodness to us, shown even in creation, will help us worship God as he intends. The whole testimony of scripture is filled with evidence of worship as a result of beholding God's creation (see Psalm 8 for example). In this song, a chorus was added to add emphasis to the fact that God is not only our creator but also redeemer. He hasn't simply left us with the testimony of creation, but has furnished his son, the Lord Jesus, who came to redeem us, as proof of not only His existence, but his lovingkindness.
The phrase "cross-centered" has become popular recently. We have a continual need to keep the cross of Christ before us and for this central act that secured our salvation to saturate our life of worship. As the writer of Hebrews challenges us, we should be "fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." (Heb 12:2 NASB) This song reminds us of what Jesus did on our behalf and of the future and final salvation that awaits us because of Him. As we contemplate the significance of the cross we can truly celebrate the blessings God has poured out on us through Christ - that "all our sins [were] on Jesus laid", and that a "full redemption [is] flowing from the sacrifice He made". Praise God!
Revelation chapter 5 gives us an amazing glimpse into what heaven will be like. We will see Christ, the Lamb, adored by millions, saying "Worthy art Thou..." In this song, powerful lyrics combine with a majestic tune and careful repetition to highlight this eternal chant. As we sing, we can imagine the glory of singing in the full presence of our Lord.
Another song of love for the Lord Jesus, "For I am His" explains why He is a friend that sticks closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24). Because He drew us, suffered for us, and is so gentle and wise, our heart's desire is to give Him our lives. May we say with the song, "For I am His".
There are many contemporary worship songs that we could consider "love" songs to Jesus. While we should certainly pour out our hearts in love to our Savior, most of these songs communicate a mere sentimental love that hardly surpasses the "love" our culture sings about and advertises to every day. What a joy to find a love song that shows WHY we love Christ, and the fact that our love drives us to want to be like Him more and more. Songs like this will help our people to know and feel the love of Christ - both His love for us and our love for Him.
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