Our Lutheran Hymnal places Hymn 556, ‘O God, our help in ages past’, among those suitable for ‘Opening and Close of the Year.’ In our hymnal it has six verses:
O God, our help in ages past,
Our help for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.Under the shadow of Thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is Thine arm alone,
And our defence is sure.Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received its frame,
From everlasting Thou art God,
To endless years the same.A thousand ages in Thy sight
Are like an evening gone,
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.Time, like an everlasting stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be Thou our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.
This hymn, one of the grandest in the whole realm of English hymnody, is a paraphrase of Psalm 90, a psalm of Moses. It is more than a metrical version of this Psalm; it is a grand commentary on the whole subject of time, which is the theme of the psalm. Originally, it was part of The Psalms of David imitated in the language of the New Testament, published by Isaac Watts in 1719. In this book he paraphrased in Christian verse nearly the entire psalter. This hymn undoubtedly ranks as one of the finest of all Watts’s 600 or more hymns.
Isaac Watts, often called the father of English hymnody, was born on July 17, 1674, in Southampton, England. He was the eldest of nine children. His father was a deacon in a dissenting Congregational church [dissenting from the State Church of England], and at the time of his son’s birth he was in prison for his non-conformist beliefs. As a boy, young Isaac displayed literary genius, writing verses at an early age. It is said he had an annoying habit of rhyming everyday conversation, and that one day when he was scolded by his father for this practice, he cried out, ‘Oh, Father, do some pity take, and I will no more verses make.’
One of Watts’s early concerns was the low ebb of music in the churches. The singing consisted of ponderous psalms only. His father one day challenged him to write something better for the congregation, a challenge which he accepted. Because of this bold departure from the traditional Psalms as well as the use of his new ‘hymns of human composure’ [hymns composed by humans], Watts was considered to be a radical churchman.
Although Isaac Watts was frail in health during much of his life, he was a scholarly genius in many fields. His essays, sermons, catechisms and treatises on theology, logic, etc., had a powerful influence on the thinking of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.
Isaac Watts died in 1748 at the age of seventy-four. His monument was placed in Westminster Abbey.
Other hymns by Watts include ‘I sing the mighty power of God’ (LH 598, listed as a hymn ‘For the Young’); ‘When I survey the wondrous cross’ (LH 54, one of our Passion hymns), and ‘Joy to the world’ (LH 627, one of our Christmas Carols).
A hymn like ‘O God, our help in ages past’ deserves majestic music. No one has ever disputed the musical worth of the tune for this hymn, ‘St. Anne’, composed by William Croft in 1708. Croft had earned his Doctorate in Music at Oxford University. He was known as one of the finest English musicians of his time. He was organist at the Church of St. Anne in Soho, London, during the reign of Queen Anne.
As evidence of the musical worth of this tune, composers such as George F. Handel and J. S. Bach borrowed it for their own works. For example, Handel used the tune in an anthem entitled ‘O praise the Lord,’ while Bach made use of it in his great Fugue in E-Flat Major, often called ‘St. Anne’s Fugue.’
[The paragraphs above are from 101 Hymn stories: the inspiring true stories behind 101 favorite hymns, by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1982]
As the calendar year 2026, draws to a close, and the lavender-blue flowers of our jacarandas will soon be signalling another Advent season and a new church year, it is timely to pray with Moses:
Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.
Before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
from everlasting to everlasting you are God. Amen.
Dr Greg Lockwood