First Line: For ever with the Lord !,

For ever with the Lord !
Amen, so let it be ;
Life from the dead is in that word,
'Tis immortality.
Here in the body pent,
Absent from Him I roam,
Yet nightly pitch my moving tent,
A day's march nearer home.

Nearer home, nearer home,
A day's march nearer home.

2 My Father's house on high,
Home of my soul ; how near
At times to faith's foreseeing eye
Thy golden gates appear !
Ah, then my spirit faints
To reach the land I love ;
The bright inheritance of saints,
Jerusalem above.

3 Yet clouds will intervene,
And all my prospect flies ;
Like Noah's dove, I flit between
Rough seas and stormy skies.
Anon the clouds depart,
The winds and waters cease ;
While sweetly o'er my gladdened heart
Expands the bow of peace,

4 I hear at morn and even,
At noon and midnight hour—
The choral harmonies of heaven
Earth's Babel-tongues o'erpower —
That resurrection word,
That shout of victory,
Once more: For ever with the Lord !
Amen, so let it be !