Thy hand, O God, has guided

Thy hand, O God, has guided. Edward Hayes Plumptre* (1821-1891). This hymn on church unity was first published in the Supplement (1889) to the Second Edition of A&M. It has since been included in over fifty hymnbooks. In the original text it had six stanzas, but one or two are often omitted, most frequently stanza 3:

When shadows thick were falling,
    And all seemed sunk in night,
Thou, Lord, didst send thy servants,
    Thy chosen sons of light.
On them and on thy people
    Thy plenteous grace was poured,
And this was still their message,
    One church, one faith, one Lord.

Modernised variants exist with the opening ‘Your hand, O God, has guided’ or ‘Your hand, O Lord, has guided’. The tune THORNBURY, with which it is often associated, was written for it by Basil Harwood* for use at a festival of the London Church Choir Association in 1898 and entered A&M in the 1916 ‘Second Supplement’. It has contributed much to the hymn’s popularity.

The main strength of the hymn lies in its powerful refrain ‘One church, one faith, one Lord’. Plumptre wrote it as a pledge to unity in the face of divisions threatening the Church of England in his day, and it was entitled ‘Church Defence’ in A&M. Therefore it has sometimes been objected that the hymn presents an idealised view of the achievements and future prospects of the established church, while disregarding the existence of other denominations. The criticism has also been made that it misrepresents Ephesians 4: 4-5: ‘There is one body and one Spirit ... one Lord, one faith, one baptism’. While there is some truth in these comments, the hymn speaks to situations beyond those for which it was originally written.

The unity of the church in the sense of the whole body of Christ’s people is an issue of continuing concern, and many non-Anglican churches have found the hymn useful, sometimes with adaptations. It continues to find favour for ecumenical services. It is found in Australia in WOV and TIS, in Canada in VU , and in the USA in a number of books, notably Lutheran ones. See Hymnaty.org.

Sheila Doyle