Come Ye That Fear The Lord
George P. Jackson 1943 

Come Ye That Fear The Lord

Public Domain Revival Gospel and Spiritual based on James Montgomery's "Come Ye That Fear The Lord" from George P. Jackson's White and Negro Spirituals

ARTIST: from George P. Jackson's White and Negro Spirituals;  

SHEET MUSIC:

CATEGORY: Traditional and Public Domain Gospel

DATE: 1848

RECORDING INFO: Come Ye That Fear The Lord

Washington Glass  The Revivalist 1853 "The Happy Convert"

George P. Jackson's White and Negro Spirituals

OTHER NAMES: "The Happy Convert"

RELATED TO:

SOURCES: George P. Jackson's White and Negro Spirituals

NOTES: "Come Ye That Fear The Lord" is a revival hymn based on the first verse of James Montgomery's original hymn (see below). It appears in George P. Jackson's White and Negro Spirituals. 

The song was redone with the famous Captain Kidd melody (found in many folks songs and hymns including Lonesone Road Blues; Banjo Pickin' Girl; Crawdad; Wondrous Love) in Richard Weaver's Tune Book, London, 1861. The first line now appearing: 

Come ye that fear the Lord, unto me, unto me,

Biography James Montgomery (1771-1854) When Montgomery was five years old, his fam­i­ly moved to the Mo­rav­i­an set­tle­ment at Grace­hill, near Bal­ly­mena, Coun­ty An­trim. Two years lat­er, he was sent to the Ful­neck Sem­in­ary in York­shire. He left Ful­neck in 1787 to work in a shop in Mir­field, near Wake­field. Soon tir­ing of that, he se­cured a sim­i­lar po­si­tion at Wath, near Rother­ham, on­ly to find it as un­suit­a­ble as his pre­vi­ous job. A trip to Lon­don, hop­ing to find a pub­lish­er for his youth­ful po­ems, end­ed in fail­ure. In 1792, he glad­ly left Wath for Shef­field to be as­sist­ant to Mr. Gales, auc­tion­eer, book­sel­ler, and print­er of the Shef­field Reg­is­ter. In 1794, Gales left Eng­land to avoid po­lit­ic­al pro­se­cu­tion. Mont­gom­ery took the Shef­field Reg­is­ter in hand, changed its name to the Shef­field Iris, and con­tin­ued to ed­it it for 32 years. Dur­ing the next two years he was im­pris­oned twice, first for re­print­ing a song in com­mem­or­a­tion of the fall of the Bas­tille, then for giv­ing an ac­count of a ri­ot in Shef­field.

The ed­it­ing of his pa­per, the com­po­si­tion and pub­li­ca­tion of his po­ems and hymns, the de­liv­ery of lec­tures on po­e­try in Shef­field and at the Roy­al In­sti­tu­tion, Lon­don, and the ad­vo­ca­cy of for­eign mis­sions and the Bi­ble So­ci­e­ty, gave great va­ri­e­ty, but very lit­tle of stir­ring in­ci­dent in his life, though he did find time to write 400 hymns. In 1833, Mont­gom­ery re­ceived a roy­al pen­sion of £200 per year.

Come Ye That Fear The Lord- Montgomery

Come, ye that fear the Lord,
And love Him while ye fear;
Come, and with heart and hand record
Your vow and covenant here.

Vow to be His alone
Who bought you with a price;
Now render back to God His own,
By free-will sacrifice.

Here to His altar brought,
Your covenant renew,
To be in word, and deed, and thought,
Faithful to Him and true.

And true and faithful He
To you will ever prove,
Though hills were swept into the sea,
And mountains should remove.

Then be His law our choice,
The joy of young and old,
As sheep that hear their shepherd's voice,
And follow to the fold.

So shall His staff and rod
Conduct us and defend:
God is a covenant-keeping God,
And loves unto the end.

The song with the Captain Kidd melody and new lyrics is found as early as 1853 under the title "The Happy Convert" (lyrics below) in The Revivalist by Washington Glass. George Pullen Jackson includes a spiritual version in his White and Negro Spirituals from Taylor's Plantation Melodies No. 69. The spiritual is the same as found in "The Happy Convert" version except the end line is repeated.

Come Ye That Fear The Lord- Spiritual from Taylor's Plantation Melodies No. 69

Come, ye that fear the Lord, unto me, unto me,
Come, ye that fear the Lord, unto me.
I 've something good to say
About the narrow way,
For Christ, the other day, saved my soul, saved my soul,
For Christ, the other day, saved my soul.


The Happy Convert (Come Ye That Fear The Lord)  The Revivalist by Washington Glass 1853

1 Come, ye that fear the Lord, unto me, unto me,
Come, ye that fear the Lord, unto me;
I 've something good to say
About the narrow way,
For Christ, the other day, saved my soul.

 2 He gave me first to see what I was, what I was,
He gave me first to see what I was;
He gave me first to see
My guilt and misery,
And then he set me free—bless his name.

3 My old companions said he's undone, he's undone,
My old companions said he's undone;
My old companions said
He's surely going mad;
But Jesus makes me glad—bless his name.

4 O if they did but know what I feel, what I feel,
0 if they did but know what I feel;
Had they but eyes to see
Their guilt and misery,
They'd be as mad as me—I believe.

5 Some said he'll soon give o'er—you shall see, you shall see,
Some said he'll soon give o'er, you shall see;
Some time has passed away
Since I began to pray,
And I feel the Lord to-day—bless his name.

6 And now I 'm going home to the Lord, to the Lord,
And now I 'm going home to the Lord;   
And now I'm going home—    
Poor sinner wilt thou come,
Or meet an awful doom from the Lord?

7 Oh, had I angel's wings I would fly, I would fly,
Oh, had I angel's wings I would fly;
Had I wings like yonder dove,    
I soon would soar above,
And see the God I love on his throne.