The hauntingly beautiful tune for this hymn was composed in just fifteen minutes on a scrap of paper. In 1919, the renowned English composer John Ireland was asked to provide a new melody for The Public School Hymn Book, and this beloved tune was the quick, inspired result. The words themselves date much further back to 1664, penned by the seventeenth-century clergyman Samuel Crossman during a golden age of English Christian poetry. Crossman’s deeply personal text explores the profound paradox of Holy Week: the crowds bitterly rejected and demanded the crucifixion of the very "Prince of Life" who came only to heal their afflictions. Yet the hymn marvels at how Christ responds to this human hatred with a "love unknown," willingly suffering to show "love to the loveless" in order to make them "lovely." As we sing this moving meditation, we are invited to stand in awe of a Savior who would take our death and lay in our tomb so that He might forever be our friend.
Sung at Our Saviour
2026