The Cyber Hymnal ‎#8471

8471. How Fair Are The Lilies

1 How fair are the lilies, what fragrance they yield,
Unwatched and untended by man!
For the Lord gives them beauty to brighten the field,
And the flowers are part of His plan.
Let me never despair of His love and His care,
If He thinks of the flowers, if on fields He has smiled,
He will care so much more for a child.

2 There is not a sparrow that cleaves the blue air,
Unnoticed by God in its fall;
For He made them, He knows them, they all have His care,
And He loves them altho’ they’re so small.
Let us bless His dear name who is always the same,
For He wants us to know that we’re thought of above,
And that each little child has His love.

3 The moss grows unseen in the niche of the wall,
But could not be there without God;
And the dew drops that find it, where rain cannot fall,
He has purposely scattered abroad;
So in my lowly place I may still feel His grace,
For the dew of His love can e’en come to me there,
And His blessing in answer to prayer.

4 As we in His beautiful image were made,
He loves us beyond all beside;
But it grieved Him when sin caused that image to fade,
And to give the lost beauty He died;
And He now from His throne would make us His own,
He is saying with love that is boundless and free,
"Let the little ones come unto Me."

Text Information

• First Line: How fair are the lilies, what fragrance they yield
• Title: How Fair Are The Lilies
• Author: Edward Hall Jackson (1880)
• Language: English
• Source: The School Hymnal by William Rawson Stevenson (London: E. Marlborough, 1880)
• Copyright: Public Domain

Tune Information

• Name: [How fair are the lilies, what fragrance they yield]
• Composer: Carey Bonner
• Key: G Major or modal
• Copyright: Public Domain
• Notes: Some hymnals snow the composer as Herman von Müller, one of Bonner's pseudonyms