Sweet is the Work

This was our closing hymn today and I had fun trying to come up with ways to modify this. When we sang it, we skipped verse 5, which is nice. For a hymn that starts with the word "sweet," the violent imagery of war is very stark.

To include Heavenly Mother, I changed "my God, my King" to "my Queen, my King" so that it's a list of multiple people instead of modifiers of one person. I also pluralized the rest of the verses. I completely re-wrote the first line of verse 3 to "In Them, my heart in triumph soars." I tried to maintain the feeling and rhyme there; I hope I succeeded. In verse 4, I changed, "thy face in full felicity" to "they faces in felicity" with "in" on the beat "full" was in.



Sweet is the work, my Queen, my King,
To praise thy names, give thanks and sing,
To show thy love by morning light,
And talk of all thy truths at night.

Sweet is the day of sacred rest.
No mortal care shall seize my breast.
Oh, may my heart in tune be found,
Like David’s harp of solemn sound!

In Them, my heart in triumph soars,
And bless their works and bless their words.
Thy works of grace, how bright they shine!
How deep thy counsels, how divine!

But, oh, what triumph shall I raise
To thy dear names through endless days,
When in the realms of joy I see
Thy faces in felicity!

Sin, my worst enemy before,
Shall vex my eyes and ears no more.
My inward foes shall all be slain,
Nor Satan break my peace again.

Then shall I see and hear and know
All I desired and wished below,
And every pow’r find sweet employ
In that eternal world of joy.