Hymns: Crown Him With Many Crowns

I’ve been exploring some of the very modern worship songs as an old guy 😀. Today, I thought that it might be good to alternate between old hymns, late 20th Century hymns, and 21st Century worship songs. Hopefully, I’ll never run out of hymns. And we won’t run out of them in heaven either, or time in which to sing them. Think of the lyrics to Amazing Grace:

When we've been there 10,000 years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we first begun.

Anyway, today’s hymn is Crown Him With Many Crowns. It’s from 1851.

What got me thinking about this one was yesterday’s modern hymn “Worthy is the Lamb“, which features the line: Crown him now with many crowns. Both hymns reference the heavenly worship that features in the Book of Revelation.

Revelation 19:11-12
¹¹ I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war. ¹² His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. 

This isn’t about earthly wars but about the return of Jesus, where the wicked, who made life miserable for everyone, will finally be dealt with. You could argue that we’re all wicked in some ways, but God offers forgiveness if we repent and trust in Jesus.

The Book of Revelation is full of symbolic language. People debate about how literal to take it. But consider the context, when the Roman empire were persecuting the early Christians. And even to this day, many Christians around the world are being persecuted. Hopefully, things will change, and all nations will become more tolerant of personal beliefs. But ultimately, only the return of Jesus will finally deal with human wickedness.

1 Crown him with many crowns,
the Lamb upon his throne.
Hark! how the heavenly anthem drowns
all music but its own.
Awake, my soul, and sing
of him who died for thee,
and hail him as thy matchless king
through all eternity.

It’s interesting that though the hymn is hugely popular in evangelical churches, the writer, Matthew Bridges, was a Protestant who became a Roman Catholic. That was the era of the Oxford Movement. The Oxford Movement was a 19th‑century reform effort within the Church of England that sought to revive ancient Christian traditions, emphasize the church’s continuity with early Catholicism, and resist growing secular influence. It wasn’t totally unlike evangelical movements. The difference is that they preferred to go all the way back to the New Testament era, though most of them respected good traditions.

There was much controversy around the lyrics within the Church of England, and tweaks were made to remove the specifically “Catholic-sounding” parts. Personally, though I’m a staunch evangelical, I never mind singing hymns written by people that I might not be closely aligned with theologically. Many churches won’t sing modern Hillsong worship songs because they mistrust the movement. But the way I see it, if I agree with the lyrics, and the music lifts my spirit, I’m happy to sing them. God can use all sorts of people to bring glory to him.

You can see the story of the hymn in this YouTube video – Crown Him With Many Crowns – story behind the hymn

Anyway, lets look at some interesting versions of the hymn: