YHWH, our God, our defender and champion,
the nations are raging, encircling around.
See! How your enemies boast in their anger?
They trumpet the vapors with which they are crowned
Crueller than iron, consuming like death,
Father, rescue our souls from their ravenous clutch!
Walk through their midst in the dark of Your fury;
No recreant spare, nor leave heathen untouched!
Jesus, Your bride is beset on all sides! How
the nations despise her for good You have wrought!
See! How they bow to themselves alone! Idols
of death unto death else can render them naught.
Happy we bear the reproach and false witness;
our witness of grace will, by faith, produce much.
Plead we "forgive them," as we have been pardoned
As seed drops our blood; leave no sinner untouched!
Spirit, the walls of Your borderless city
Are wholly surrounded by nations in ruin.
See! How the blind man demands of us glasses,
and hear how the deaf man cries out for a tune!
Starving, they steal what we offer them freely;
Our Healer, we, too, were as broken as such.
Blow through our midst in Your sweet condescension,
And stretch out our hand, leaving no soul untouched!
~
AMDG
