Reformation Day 2011

From the pen of the blessed Reformer, Dr. Martin Luther, written in 1524:

If God had not been on our side
And had not come to aid us,
The foes with all their pow’r and might
Would surely have dismayed us;
For we, His flock, would have to fear
The threat of men both far and near
Who rise in might against us.


Their furious wrath, did God permit,
Would surely have consumed us,
And as a deep and yawning pit
With life and limb entombed us.
Like men o’er whom dark waters roll
Their wrath would have engulfed our soul
And, like a flood, o’erwhelmed us.


Blest be the Lord, who foiled their threat
That they could not devour us;
Our souls, like birds, escaped their net,
They could not overpow’r us.
The snare is broken—we are free!
Our help is ever, Lord, in Thee,
Who madest earth and heaven. Amen.


Quoted from What Walther Says, p. 1200.