Dietrich Bonhoeffer - By loving forces silently surrounded

By loving forces...

By loving forces silently surrounded,

I feel quite soothed, secure, and filled with grace.

So I would like to live these days together,

and go with you into another year.

Still matters of the past are pressing our hearts

and evil days are weighing down on us.

Oh Lord, to our souls, so scared and sore,

give rescue, as it's that you made us for.

And when you pass to us the bitter chalice

of suffering, filled to the brim and more,

we take it, full of thanks and trembling not,

from this, your caring and beloved hand.

But if you want to please us, over and again,

with our shining sun and wondrous world,

let us muse on what is past, and then we shall,

with our lives, in all belong to you.

Warm and bright be our candles' flame today,

since into gloom you brought a gleaming light,

and lead again us, if you will, together!

We know it: you are beaming in the night.

When silence now will snow around us ev'rywhere,

so let us hear the all-embracing sound

of greater things than we can see and wider,

your world, and all your children's soaring hail.

By loving forces wonderfully sheltered,

we are awaiting fearlessly what comes.

God is with us at dusk and in the morning

and most assuredly on ev'ry day.

© Hilmar H. Werner, 2010

25.10.2015: 3d slightly altered version (text in the musical sheets still has to be up-dated)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, evangelical theologian, member of the anti-nazi resistance movement.

Written shortly before the turn of the year 1944/45.

Bonhoeffer was killed by the Nazis on April 9, 1945.