Lift Ev-ry Voice and Sing

I ran into these lyrics online today and find them very appropriate. I am not a Negro, and I do not belong to the nation for which this Anthem was written. Yet something about this song touches me, reminding me of how God brings us through many things; and that it is right for us to rejoice in Him.


Lift Ev-ry Voice and Sing
Written By: James Weldon Johnson

(The Negro National Anthem)
(1871-1938)

Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of hope that the present has brought us.
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for where our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered.
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered.
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,

God of our silent tears,

Thou who hast brought us thus far on the way;

Thou who hast by Thy might

Led us into the light,

Keep us forever in the path, we pray.

Lest our feet stray from the places, Our God, where we meet thee;

Lest our hearts drunk with the vine of the world we forget thee,

Shadowed beneath Thy hand,

May we forever stand,

True to our God,

True to our native land.