Come, Holy Spirit, Dove Divine
Come, Holy Spirit, Dove Divine
Come, Holy Spirit, Dove divine,
On these baptismal waters shine,
And teach our hearts, in highest strain,
To praise the Lamb for sinners slain.
We love Thy name, we love Thy laws,
And joyfully embrace Thy cause;
We love Thy cross, the shame, the pain,
O Lamb of God for sinners slain.
We sink beneath the water’s face,
And thank Thee for Thy saving grace;
We die to sin and seek a grave
With Thee, beneath the yielding wave.
And as we rise with Thee to live,
O let the Holy Spirit give
The sealing unction from above,
The joy of life, the fire of love.
ADONIRAM JUDSON and his wife, Ann, served in Burma as missionaries for a long time before they saw their first converts. During those years, Adoniram worked to translate the Bible into the Burmese language. Finally, one Burmese man responded. You can sense the hesitation in Adoniram’s journal as he wrote, “I begin to think that the grace of God has reached his heart.”
The next step was to prepare the man for baptism, and Adoniram prayed, “Oh, may it prove the beginning of a series of baptisms in the Burman Empire which shall continue in uninterrupted succession to the end of time.” When more Burmese became Christians and asked to be baptized, Judson wrote this baptismal hymn.
By the time of Judson’s death, seven thousand Burmese had come to Christ. The waiting was worth it.
When we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death. For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.
Romans 6:3-4
From the book
