Christ My Song - 277

No strength of nature can suffice - Love Constraining to Obedience (William Cowper/Johannes Thomas Rüegg)

Love Constraining to Obedience.

1. No strength of nature can suffice
  to serve the Lord aright:
and what she has she misapplies,
  for want of clearer light. PDF - Midi

2. How long beneath the law I lay
  in bondage and distress!
I toiled the precept to obey,
  but toiled without success.

3. Then, to abstain from outward sin
  was more than I could do;
now, if I feel its power within,
  I feel I hate it too.

4. Then, all my servile works were done
  a righteousness to rise;
now, freely chosen in the Son,
  I freely choose his ways.

5. "What shall I do," was then the word,
  "that I may worthier grow?"
"What shall I render to the Lord?"
  is my enquiry now.

6. To see the law by Christ fulfilled,
  and hear his pardoning voice,
changes a slave into a child,
  and duty into choice.

6,3: Romans 3, 31.

William Cowper, The Complete Poetical Works of William Cowper, 1853(?), 263.

            PDF - Midi