In the Cross of Christ I glory

In the Cross of Christ I glory. John Bowring* (1792-1872). First published in Bowring’s Hymns (1825), with the title ‘The Cross of Christ’, often changed in subsequent books to ‘Glorying in the Cross’. It is based, like Watts’s* ‘When I survey the wondrous cross’*, on Galatians 6: 14, though it differs from Watts’s hymn in its emphasis on the sublimity, radiance and peace of the cross. The cross becomes a symbol for the whole process of salvation, which adds joy to human happiness and gives strength in time of need. The word ‘sublime’ is important in this hymn, and it expresses something of Bowring’s Unitarian sympathies: without necessarily believing in the doctrine of the Atonement, he...