The golden gates are lifted up

The golden gates are lifted up. Cecil Frances Alexander* (1818-1895).  This hymn for Ascension-tide was first published in the SPCK’s Psalms and Hymns for Public Worship (1852), where it began ‘The eternal gates lift up their heads’. Alexander revised the first line for her Hymns Descriptive and Devotional (1858), and this has been adopted in most subsequent hymnals:  The golden gates are lifted up,  The doors are open’d wide, The King of Glory is gone in  Unto His Father’s side.  Thou art gone up before us, Lord,  To make for us a place, That we may be where Thou now art,  And look upon God’s face.  And ever on our earthly path  A gleam of glory lies; A light still breaks behind the cloud...