Rise Up, O Men of God
Rise up, O men of God!
Have done with lesser things.
Give heart and mind and soul and strength
To serve the King of kings.
Rise up, O men of God!
The kingdom tarries long.
Bring in the day of brotherhood
And end the night of wrong.
Rise up, O men of God!
The church for you doth wait,
Her strength unequal to her task;
Rise up and make her great!
Lift high the cross of Christ!
Tread where His feet have trod.
As brothers of the Son of Man,
Rise up, O men of God!
Words: William P. Merrill, 1911; first published in the Presbyterian newspaper The Continent.
Merrill wrote: "Nolan R. Best, then editor of The Continent, happened to say to me that there was urgent need of a brotherhood hymn... The suggestion lingered in my mind, and just about that time I came upon an article by Gerald Stanley Lee, entitled "The Church of the Strong Men." I was on one of the Lake Michigan steamers going back to Chicago for a Sunday at my own church, when suddenly this hymn came up, almost without conscious thought or effort."
Music: William H. Walter, "Festal Song"; in Hymnal Revised and Enlarged, by J.I. Tucker and W.W. Rousseau, 1894.
Click here to see the sheet music, taken from Hymns for the Family of God #398 published by Paragon Associates Inc., 1976.
Click here to hear the melody (MIDI file). For more MIDI files, type "Rise Up O Men of God" into Google or any other search engine. This one was taken from www.cyberhymnal.org.