Dear Christian people

dear christian people all, rejoice,
each soul with joy upraising.
pour forth a song with heart and voice,
with love and gladness singing.
give thanks to god, our lord above,
thanks for his miracle of love!
dearly he hath redeemed us.

he spoke to his belovèd son
with infinite compassion:
“go hence, my heart’s most precious one,
be to the lost salvation;
death, his relentless tyrant, stay,
and bear him from his sins away
with thee to live forever!”

the son came, saying: “cling to me,
thy sorrows now are ending;
freely i give myself to thee,
thy life with mine defending;
for i am thine and thou art mine,
and where i am there thou shalt shine,
the foe shall never reach us.”

“to heaven again i rise from hence,
high to my father soaring,
the master there to be, and thence
my spirit on thee pouring;
in every grief to comfort thee,
and teach thee more and more of me,
into all truth still guiding.”

“what i have done and taught on earth,
do thou, and teach, none dreading;
that so god’s kingdom may go forth,
and his high praise be spreading;
and guard thee from the words of men,
lest the great joy be lost again:
this my last charge i leave thee.”