Comfort, Comfort Ye My People

For St. John The Baptist, For Advent

Version 1
Compare: Comfort, Comfort Ye My People - Version 2

Words: "Tröstet, tröstet meine Lieben," Johannes Olearius, (1611-1684), Geistliche Singe-Kunst (Leipzig, Germany: 1671)
Translation by Catherine Winkworth

Music: "When the Lord recalls the banished"

Source: William Sterndale Bennett and Otto Goldschmidt, eds., The Chorale Book For England. Congregational Edition. (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863, Supp. 1865), Translator: Catherine Winkworth, #83.

1. Comfort, comfort ye my people,
    Speak ye peace, thus saith our God;
Comfort those who sit in darkness,
    Mourning 'neath their sorrows' load;
Speak ye to Jerusalem
Of the peace that waits for them,
Tell her that her sins I cover,
And her warfare now is over.

2. Yea, her sins our God will pardon,
    Blotting out each dark misdeed;
All that well deserved His anger
    He will no more see nor heed.
She hath suffer'd many a day,
Now her griefs have passed away,
God will change her pining sadness
Into ever-springing gladness.

3. For Elijah's voice is crying
    In the desert far and near,
Bidding all men to repentance,
    Since the kingdom now is here.
Oh that warning cry obey,
Now prepare for God a way;
Let the valleys rise to meet Him,
And the hills bow down to greet Him.

4. Make ye straight what long was crooked,
    Make the rougher places plain,
Let your hearts be true and humble,
    As befits His holy reign;
For the glory of the Lord
Now o'er earth is shed abroad,
And all flesh shall fee the token
That His Word is never broken.

Sheet Music from William Sterndale Bennett and Otto Goldschmidt, eds., The Chorale Book For England. Congregational Edition. (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863, Supp. 1865), Translator: Catherine Winkworth, #83.

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