Xanthe Hancox

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.   Galatians 6:14

As I’ve been researching these hymns over this past month, I’ve been struck by how many were written by people who were quite revolutionary in their day. It’s funny to think that today, many congregations favour newer songs because the old hymns are seen as dull and boring when, a couple of hundred years ago, people were thrown in jail for singing the same hymns.

When Isaac Watts was born in 1674, his father was in prison because he would not embrace the established Church of England. His father was eventually freed but Isaac respected his courage and remembered his mother's tales of nursing her children on the jail steps.

Watts followed in his father’s footsteps, believing that original songs of Christian experience should also be used in worship. The older tradition was based on the poetry of the Bible, notably the Psalms. In 1707, Watts published a collection titled Hymns and Spiritual Songs. In it was this classic hymn:

When I survey the wondrous cross

On which the Prince of glory died,

My richest gain I count but loss,

And pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,

Save in the death of Christ my God!

All the vain things that charm me most,

I sacrifice them to His blood.

This classic hymn of Isaac Watts has often been called the greatest hymn in the English language. ‘When I Survey the Wondrous Cross’ is significant for its innovative departure from the early English hymn style of only using paraphrased biblical texts, although the first two lines of the second verse do paraphrase Paul in Galatians 6:14.

Even more significant, is the essential gospel truth it contains. Watts understood what Paul was saying in Galatians – that we can achieve nothing on our own. No matter how good we think we are, or how rich we are, or how brilliant and accomplished we may be, we can’t save ourselves. To boast in the cross is to affirm who we are in Christ. It is to acknowledge that without grace, we could never attain anything by our own efforts.

Boasting in the cross of Jesus wasn’t exactly popular in Paul’s day, and that has not changed. Today, let this old hymn, once criticised for leading congregation astray, remind us to be bold in our faith.

Prayer: Father, my desire is to be like Paul, to boast only about what Jesus did on the cross, and not in my own accomplishments.  Forgive me for my pride, and for when I have been ashamed or even timid about my faith. Teach me to be bold. Amen

Listen to Watt’s hymn here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_fvFfPqjO4