Father, Hear the Prayer We Offer

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Father, hear the prayer we offer! Not for ease that prayer shall be

Author: Love M. Whitcomb Willis
Published in 231 hymnals

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Representative Text

1 Father, hear the prayer we offer:
not for ease that prayer shall be,
but for strength that we may ever
live our lives courageously.

2 Not for ever in green pastures
do we ask our way to be;
but the steep and rugged pathway
may we tread rejoicingly.

3 Not for ever by still waters
would we idly rest and stay;
but would smite the living fountains
from the rocks along our way.

4 Be our strength in hours of weakness,
in our wanderings be our guide;
through endeavour, failure, danger,
Father, be thou at our side.

Source: Ancient and Modern: hymns and songs for refreshing worship #629a

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Author: Love M. Whitcomb Willis

Willis, Love Maria, née Whitcomb, b. June 9, 1824, at Hancock, N.H., and married in 1858, to Frederick L. H. Willis, M.D. She lived for many years at Rochester, N.Y., and now (1907) resides at Glenora, on Seneca Lake, N.Y. Her hymn:— Father, hear the prayer I offer [Aspiration] appeared in Tiffany's Monthly, 1859. In Longfellow & Johnson's Hymns of the Spirit, 1864, No. 558, it was given in 4 stanzas of 4 lines, as "Father, hear the prayer we offer," and as "Anon." The text was in great measure rewritten, probably by S. Longfellow. This 1864 text has come into somewhat extensive use in England and America, the latest to adopt it being The English Hymnal, 1906. For these facts we are mainly indebted to the Rev. W.C. Gannett, Rochester… Go to person page >

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Related Texts

First Line:	Father, hear the prayer we offer! Not for ease that prayer shall be
Title:	Father, Hear the Prayer We Offer
Author:	Love M. Whitcomb Willis
Meter:	8.7.8.7
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

English

10 shown out of 171

Hebrew

Union Songster : Songs and Prayers for Jewish Youth (שִׁיר וּתְפִלָּה) #15

Latin

African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal #341

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Notes

Father, hear the prayer we offer. [Prayer.] Given anonymously in J. S. Adams's Psalms of Life, 1857, No. 285, in 5 stanzas of 4 lines; in Longfellow and Johnson's Unitarian Hymns of the Spirit, Boston, U.S., 1864, No. 558, in 4 stanzas of 4 lines; in the Songs for the Sanctuary, N. Y., 1865; Laudes Domini, 1884, and others; and, with an additional stanza, in W. G. Horder's Congregational Hymns, Lond., 1884.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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