O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go
“O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go” was written on the evening of Matheson’s sister’s marriage. Years before, he had been engaged, until his fiancée learned that he was going blind—that there was nothing the doctors could do—and she told him that she could not go through life with a blind man and broke off the engagement. He went blind while studying for the ministry, and his sister had been the one to care for him through the years. He was now 40, and his sister’s marriage likely brought a fresh reminder of his own heartbreak. It was in the midst of this circumstance that Matheson penned this hymn, which he said was written in five minutes. British composer Florence Margaret Spencer Palmer set it to music in 1941.
George Matheson FRSE (27 March 1842 – 28 August 1906) was a Scottish minister and hymn writer and prolific author. He was blind from the age of 17.
Matheson published only one volume of verse, Sacred Songs. All of which he commented ‘I simply followed the impression of the moment’ [8] His exegesis owes its interest to his subjective resources rather than to breadth of learning; his power lay in spiritual vision rather than balanced judgment, and in the vivid apprehension of the factors which make the Christian personality, rather than in constructive doctrinal statement.
English Lyrics
Oh love that will not let me go
I rest my weary soul in thee
I give thee back the life I owe
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be
Oh light that followest all my way
I yield my flickering torch to thee
My heart restores its borrowed ray
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be
Oh joy that seekest me through pain
I cannot close my heart to thee
I trace the rainbow through the rain
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be
Oh cross that liftest up my head
I dare not ask to fly from thee
I lay in dust’s life’s glory dead
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be
