Journal: Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society
Volume: JOTGES 04:2 (Autumn 1991)
Article: A Hymn Of Grace
Author: Frances A. Mosher

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JOTGES 4:2 (Autumn 91) p. 93

A Hymn Of Grace

Frances A. Mosher

Dallas, Texas

Not What These Hands Have Done

Not what these hands have done
Can save this guilty soul;
Not what this toiling flesh has borne,
Can make my spirit whole.

Not what I feel or do,
Can give me peace with God;
Not all my prayers, or sighs, or tears,
Can ease my awful load.

Thy work alone, my Saviour,
Can ease this weight of sin;
Thy blood alone, O Lamb of God,
Can give me peace within.

Thy love to me, O God,
Not mine, O Lord, to Thee,
Can rid me of this dark unrest,
And set my spirit free.

No other work save Thine,
No meaner blood will do;
No strength save that which is divine,
Can bear me safely through.

Thy grace alone, O God,
To me can pardon speak;
Thy power alone, O Son of God,
Can this sore bondage break.

I bless the Christ of God,
I rest on love divine;
And with unfaltering lip and heart
I call the Saviour mine.

Horatius Bonar (1808–1889)

JOTGES 4:2 (Autumn 91) p. 94

Christians convinced of the truth of salvation by grace through faith frequently focus on the point of salvation—the once-for-all transaction in which grace through faith in Christ alone forever removes the believer from the power of sin and death and objectively assures his eternal life as a redeemed child of God. “Not What These Hands Have Done” leaves no doubt that its author, Horatius Bonar, held a scripturally sound view of this transaction. The first stanza’s declaration that the works of our hands and the toils of our flesh cannot save us has scriptural basis in Titus 3:5 and Rom 4:5. Bonar further asserts in the third, fifth, and sixth stanzas that God’s grace by way of Christ’s blood atonement provides our only deliverance from sin, a view supported by 1 John 1:7 and Eph 2:8.

However, some phrases in the hymn seem to address spiritual issues beyond the initial point of salvation. The third stanza’s references to being eased of “this weight of sin” and receiving “peace within,” and the fourth stanza’s mention of being rid of “this dark unrest” may speak less of the settled fact of the author’s salvation than of his present experience and enjoyment of it. This, too, he proclaims, is by grace, rather than by fleshly effort. Passages such as ...

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