–Luke 17:5– This verse is the inspiration for the hymn, “Oh for a Faith that Will Not shrink”. The disciples, feeling incapable of measuring up to the standards set forth by the Lord, cry out to Him, “Lord, increase our faith!” This is the cry of faith asking the Lord to supply us in every need.
“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are” (1 John 3:1) Parenting begins with parents remembering that they live in God’s kingdom ruled by God’s lavished love in Christ. The Gospel is the basis for parenting, not some how-to book with a list of rules. God’s underserved love in Christ reminds parents that having a child is not a right but a blessing. Parents do not merely produce children as an industry produces a product. They are entrusted with a child as a gift from God. All parenting flows from the gift of the heavenly Father.
A hymn which asks God to help us have the faith that overcomes the world is "O For a Faith That Will Not Shrink." The text was written by William Hiley Bragge Bathurst, who was born at Clevedale near Bristol, England, on Aug. 28, 1796, the son of Charles Bragge, a one-time member of Parliament from Bristol, who changed his name to Bathurst when he succeeded to his uncle’s estate at Lydney Park in Gloucestershire. William was educated at Winchester and at Christ Church College of Oxford, from which he graduated in 1818, and became an Anglican minister the following year. Beginning in 1820, he served at Barwick-in-Elmet near Leeds for 32 years.
During this time Bathurst completed his Psalms and Hymns for Public and Private Use in 1830, published in 1831, from which this hymn, originally entitled "The Power of Faith," is taken. He also produced A Translation of the Georgics of Virgil and Metrical Musings or Thoughts on Sacred Subjects in Verse, both in 1849. In 1852, he resigned his ministry because of an inability to reconcile his doctrinal views with certain portions of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, especially regarding the baptismal and burial services, and retired to private life at Darley Dale near Matlock. On the death of an older brother in 1863, he succeeded to the family estate at Lydney Park in Gloucestershire, where he died on Nov. 25, 1877.
All told, Bathurst is credited with over 200 hymn texts as well as The Roman Antiquities of Lydney Park which was published posthumously in 1879. Various emendations have been made to the text of this hymn over the years, and several tunes have been used with it. Most of our books have used a tune (Azmon) composed in 1828 by Carl Gotthelf Glaser (1784-1829). It was arranged as a hymn tune in 1839 by Lowell Mason (1792-1872). Since this melody is most commonly associated with Isaac Watts’s "I’m Not Ashamed to Own My Lord." 1
Sources:
The Lord’s Supper, copyright © Ed Riojas, Higher Things
1. https://hymnary.org/text/o_for_a_faith_that_will_not_shrink
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