God moves in a mysterious way

with
DUNDEE (FRENCH, NORWICH)
LONDON NEW

I. Text: Origins

Many people, when quoting this famous first line, might think they are quoting Scripture, but in reality they are quoting the English poet William Cowper (1731–1800; pronounced ‘Cooper’). The genesis of the hymn is described in two different stories. The oldest, and perhaps the most reliable, can be found in the Memoirs of the Life and Writings of William Cowper, Esq., Rev. ed. (London: Whittingham & Arliss, 1814), pp. 32–33, by Samuel Greatheed. Referring to one of Cowper’s major psychological breakdowns, the memoir described his self-awareness of the impending storm:

Of this sad reverse in his experience, he conceived some presentiment as it drew near, and during a solitary walk in the fields, composed that hymn, of the Olney collection, beginning, “God moves in a mysterious way,” &c. which is very expressive of that faith and hope, which he retained at the time, even in prospect of his severe distress. Mr. Cowper’s relapse occurred in 1773, in his forty-second year. . . . His spirits, no longer sustained upon the wings of faith and hope, sunk, with their weight of natural depression, into the horrible abyss of absolute despair.

In the preface, Greatheed vouched for the accuracy of the volume, stating, “Nothing is here added, of which I was not either personally a witness, or had not positive assurance from others that were so” (p. iv).

The basis of the other famous story behind the hymn is less clear, even though it has had wider circulation. It can be found as early as 1861 in The British Friend, vol. 19, no. 3, p. 58:

On the eve of the sad attack of the poet’s constitutional melancholy, in January 1773, he composed a hymn, of which the original title was “Light shining out of darkness.” He firmly believed that the Divine will was that he should drown himself in a particular part of the river Ouse, two or three miles from his residence at Olney. He one evening ordered a post-chaise, and desired the driver to take him to that spot, which the man readily undertook to do, as he was well acquainted with it. However, several hours were consumed in seeking it, but in vain. The driver was at last compelled to admit that he had entirely lost his road. Cowper thus escaped the temptation, returned home, and immediately wrote that hymn which has ministered comfort to thousands already, and will be the language of submission and patience to generations yet to come.

The accuracy of this story is questionable, but by his own account, Cowper had once taken a carriage ride to drown himself, except in Cowper’s telling of it, they found the spot; his account does not say he wrote the hymn—or any hymns—immediately after. This was in November 1763:

Not knowing where to poison myself, for I was liable to continual interruption in my chambers, from my laundress and her husband, I laid aside that intentbn, and resolved upon drowning. For that purpose, I immediately took a coach, and ordered the man to drive to Tower wharf, intending to throw myself into the river from the Custom House quay. . . . I left the coach upon the Tower wharf, intending never to return to it, but upon coming to the quay, I found the water low, and a porter seated upon some goods there, as if on purpose to prevent me. This passage to the bottomless pit being mercifully shut against me, I returned back to the coach, and ordered it to return to the Temple.[1]

Reflecting on that experience two years later, in a letter to Lady Hesketh, 4 September 1765, Cowper wrote:

Two of my friends have been cut off during my illness, in the midst of such a life as it is frightful to reflect upon: and here am I, in better health and spirits than I can almost remember to have enjoyed before, after having spent months in the apprehension of instant death. How mysterious are the ways of Providence! Why did I receive grace and mercy? Why was I preserved, afflicted for my good, received, as I trust, into favour, and blessed with the greatest happiness I can ever know, or hope for, in this life, while these were overtaken by the great arrest, unawakened, unrepenting, and every way unprepared for it?[2]

Some scholars, including John Julian in his Dictionary of Hymnology (1892), p. 433, doubt the plausibility of the popular river story, based on descriptions from various accounts saying when Cowper had entered his suicidal state, he had stopped writing and did not resume until April of 1774. Therefore, historians typically put the composition of the hymn shortly before his mental breakdown in January 1773. Regarding Cowper’s river story, Marylynn Rouse, director of The John Newton Project, contended, “Linking it to the hymn is mythical.”[3]

A decade later, on 13 January 1784, Cowper wrote a letter to Newton, expressing his bewilderment over his battle with depression:

If I am recoverable, why am I thus? Why crippled and made useless in the church, just at that time of life when, my judgment and experience being matured, I might be most useful? Why cashiered and turned out of service till, according to the course of nature, there is not life enough left in me to make amends for the years I have lost, till there is no reasonable hope left that the fruit can ever pay the expense of the fallow? I forestall the answer—God’s ways are mysterious, and he giveth no account of his matters—an answer that would serve my purpose as well as theirs that use it. There is a mystery in my destruction, and in time it shall be explained.[4]

II. Text: Publication

The hymn was printed three times in 1774, all textually the same. In July 1774, it was printed in John Newton’s Twenty Six Letters on Religious Subjects, pp. 215–216, in six stanzas of four lines, without music (Fig. 1).

Also in July 1774, it appeared in The Gospel Magazine, p. 307 (Fig. 2), where it was curiously signed “J.W.” Pseudonyms were fairly common in that publication, so this could simply be an example of attempted anonymity.

Lastly, the hymn also appeared in Richard Conyers’ Collection of Psalms and Hymns (London: J. & W. Oliver, 1774), pp. 258–259, unattributed. A few years later, the hymn was part of the important collection by Newton & Cowper, Olney Hymns (1779), p. 328.

III. Text: Analysis

The opening lines possibly recall Isaiah 55:8 (“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord,” ESV). The second part of the first stanza reflects God’s powers over storm and sea, as in passages like Psalm 107:23-30 or Job 38. The second stanza includes ideas from Romans 11:33 (“Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!”). The showers of blessing in stanza three are probably an allusion to Ezekiel 34:26. The first part of stanza four has similar sentiments as Proverbs 3:5 (“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding”). The mention of bitter and sweet in stanza five possibly relates to passages like Proverbs 27:7 or Revelation 10:9–10, although the meaning is a little different here. In the Olney Hymns printing, the last stanza is annotated with John 13:7 (“Jesus answered him, ‘What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand’”). Joseph told Pharaoh’s officers in Genesis 40:8, who inquired about a mysterious dream, “Do not interpretations belong to God?”

Regarding the second stanza, British hymn writer Timothy Dudley-Smith mulled over the imagery of Cowper’s “mines”:

I have come to think that we are misled by the metaphor of “mining,” which leads us—me, at least—to picture miners deep beneath the earth at work with picks and shovels. This is a scene vividly described in Job, chapter 28, which must surely have been Cowper’s inspiration. Silver, gold, iron, and copper all come from the mine, but not “wisdom,” so why does the verse place God’s “treasury” underground? What has helped me to a less puzzling interpretation is the use of the noun “mine” in a saying such as “He is a mine of information.” This does not call to mind simply the visual image of the tin-miner or collier, but also of a capacious store which is, I find, the primary figurative sense given to the word in the Oxford English Dictionary. We could then paraphrase Cowper’s lines as expressing how God’s providence, the subject of the hymn, includes an inexhaustible “store” of divine wisdom, working his will for our good as Paul describes it in Romans 8:28. How far this is in fact what Cowper meant we shall never know, but it appeals to me in singing the hymn.[5]

This hymn is one of the most significant in the English language. Erik Routley called it “an outstanding example of terse, epigrammatic, memorable writing. . . . Consider how much of its text and thought-form has found its way into our common speech.”[6] Elsewhere, he wrote, “This hymn is of a very rare and gracious kind, the hymn of the mystery of God’s being and acts. It runs so smoothly, its lines are so neat and quotable, its thought so familiar, that it is easy to miss the genius of it.”[7]

J.R. Watson said of this hymn:

It is the Christian’s duty and joy to interpret the signs of God’s providence: and the concluding verse sums up beautifully the hymn’s subject. Belief is needed, and then God, who is the great interpreter, will make everything clear. Without that interpretation, His ways are mysterious and his ‘bright designs’ are hidden. The hymn is therefore one of trust and hope, and the perception of the goodness of God (even if it seems to be hidden) is the ‘Light shining out of darkness’ of the hymn’s title.[8]

IV. Tunes

1. DUNDEE

The hymn has been published with a number of different tunes, but it is most frequently set to DUNDEE, a Psalm tune from The CL Psalmes of David in Meeter (Edinburgh: Andro Hart, 1615). In that collection, it was called “The French Toone,” thus the tune is sometimes called FRENCH. It also appears under the name NORWICH, which was how it was named in the collections of John Playford, as in The Whole Book of Psalms (London: W. Godbid, 1677). Modern collections continue to print the tune as it was arranged by Thomas Ravenscroft, in The Whole Booke of Psalmes (London, 1621), where it appeared with Psalm 36 (Fig. 3) and Psalm 90, melody in the tenor part. The division of the four parts into separate staves, as seen here, is called choirbook format.

2. LONDON NEW

Cowper’s text is also frequently set to LONDON NEW, another tune with Scottish roots, coming from The Psalmes of David in Prose and Meeter (1635 | Fig. 4). In that collection, it was given without text and labeled NEWTOUN TUNE. The name LONDON NEW and a variation in the melody came shortly thereafter in the collections of John Playford, starting with Psalms & Hymns in Solemn Musick of Foure Parts (London: W. Godbid, 1671). The pairing of this tune with Cowper’s text was popularized via Hymns Ancient & Modern (1861).

3. Bob Kauflin

In more recent years, Cowper’s text has been reset with new music by composers for modern worship settings. These newer tunes generally provide a sense of melancholy and/or humility, qualities not reflected well in the older Scottish tunes. One such setting is by Bob Kauflin for Sovereign Grace Music (available here), recorded on the album Worship God Live (2005). Kauflin’s version adds a refrain, “So God, we trust in You; O God, we trust in You; when tears are great and comforts few, we hope in mercies ever new; we trust in You.” Kauflin provided this description of his process for writing the new tune:

I first heard this hymn at a Desiring God conference. I loved the words but didn’t think the music captured the depth of the lyrics. I didn’t think about it much until the Indonesian tsunami of 2004, which left tens of thousands dead. Over the next few weeks I worked on a new tune and a new chorus for the hymn. I wanted the melody to be more reflective and provide time to think about the lyrics. In singing Cowper’s words I thought it needed a place where we could express a faith-filled response, in light of the mercy God has shown us in Christ.[9]

4. Jeremy Casella

In 2009, Indelible Grace published a setting by Jeremy Casella on their album Indelible Grace VI: Joy Beyond the Sorrow. Regarding this setting, Kevin Twit explained:

One thing that a maturing Christian should understand is that God’s ways are not our ways, and thus we must always be humble in how we think about God’s work in our lives. Thinking we have got God “figured out” can be a real barrier to walking humbly with our God. This hymn is a great reminder of that important lesson. . . . Newton writes in the preface to the Olney Hymns that he was so discouraged when Cowper was struck ill that he set aside the project and almost never completed it. . . . The hymn is a call to trust the Lord, even in the dark (Isaiah 50:10). But I love that it was written by one who knew firsthand the difficulty of this.[10]

by CHRIS FENNER
for Hymnology Archive
5 October 2018
rev. 5 October 2023

Footnotes:

1. Robert Southey, The Life of William Cowper, Esq. (1839), pp. 92–93: Archive.org

2. Thomas Taylor, The Life of William Cowper, Esq. (1833), pp. 50–51: Google

3. Correspondence with Marylynn Rouse, 5 October 2023.

4. Robert Southey, The Life of William Cowper, Esq. (1839), pp. 286–287: Archive.org

5. Timothy Dudley-Smith, A Functional Art: Reflections of a Hymn Writer (Oxford: University Press, 2017), p. 87.

6. Erik Routley, Hymns and Human Life (London: John Murray, 1952), p. 4.

7. Erik Routley, Hymns of the Faith (Greenwich, CT: Seabury Press, 1956), p. 40.

8. J.R. Watson, Annotated Anthology of Hymns (Oxford: University Press, 2002), p. 221.

9. Correspondence from Bob Kauflin, 20 May 2019.

10. Kevin Twit, “God moves in a mysterious way,” Indelible Grace Hymn Book: http://hymnbook.igracemusic.com/hymns/god-moves-in-a-mysterious-way

Related resources:

John Julian, “God moves in a mysterious way,” A Dictionary of Hymnology (London, 1892), p. 433: Google Books

Louis Benson, “God moves in a mysterious way,” Studies of Familiar Hymns, Second Series (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1923), pp. 142-153: Archive.org

Erik Routley, “God moves in a mysterious way,” Hymns and the Faith (Greenwich, CT: Seabury Press, 1956), pp. 39-50.

Robin A. Leaver, “God moves in a mysterious way,” Hymnal 1982 Companion, vol. 3B (NY: Church Hymnal Corp., 1994), no. 677.

Nicholas Temperley, “LONDON NEW,” Hymnal 1982 Companion, vol. 3A (NY: Church Hymnal Corp., 1994), no. 50.

Madeleine Forell Marshall, “God moves in a mysterious way,” Common Hymnsense (Chicago: GIA, 1995), pp. 93–97.

Paul Westermeyer, “DUNDEE,” Let the People Sing: Hymn Tunes in Perspective (Chicago: GIA, 2005), p. 110.

Leland Ryken, “God moves in a mysterious way,” 40 Favorite Hymns on the Christian Life (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2019), pp. 134–137: Amazon

“God moves in a mysterious way,” Hymnary.org:
https://hymnary.org/text/god_moves_in_a_mysterious_way

Elizabeth Cosnett, “God moves in a mysterious way,” The Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology:
http://www.hymnology.co.uk/g/god-moves-in-a-mysterious-way

“God moves in a mysterious way,” Indelible Grace Hymn Book:
http://hymnbook.igracemusic.com/hymns/god-moves-in-a-mysterious-way

“God moves,” Sovereign Grace Music:
https://sovereigngracemusic.org/music/songs/god-moves/

Hymn Tune Index:
http://hymntune.library.uiuc.edu/default.asp