This particular hymn is universally reviled by ex-Worldwiders. Given both the melody and the lyrics, it’s easy to understand why. A clearer picture of the apocalypse and armageddon that we expected in our lifetimes, is nowhere to be found.
Blow the horn, let Zion hear, for God’s day is now at hand;
Let the people tremble in this day of clouds and gloominess;
Troops so great and mighty strong, there has never been the like;
Nothing shall escape as they devour the stubble on their way.
Fire before them shall devour, flames ablaze are left behind;
Such as Eden was shall become a wilderness that’s desolate;
Like the noise of chariots; and as horsemen do they run;
Nothing shall escape as they devour the stubble on their way.
People are faint at their sight, for they run like mighty men,
Moving each on his own way they do not tangle in their paths,
Each does follow his own line, climbing walls like men of war;
Then they charge as warriors and advance like fighters on their way.
They upon the city leap, break through weapons each unharmed
Run up on the walls and climb in houses through the windows leap;
Earth is quaking as they come, heaven shake, stars cease to shine.
Then the Eternal thunders and the sun and moon become both black!
Not only the dark words and terrifying images made this song universally hated. The dirge-like, ponderous melody, combined with the mind-numbing repetition, often set the stage for a complete trance-like mentality.
Any Armstrongists still clinging to the idea that “oh the church wasn’t SO bad you know” needs to sing this hymn in public, and see what kind of a reaction it gets. If they aren’t carted away for hate speech by doing so.
Hard to believe, looking back on it, that we literally did believe in all of the events of the book of Revelation, exactly as pictured, both in this hymn, and in the canonical christian book itself. Ex-Worldwiders could write a Left Behind series that would curl the average evangelical’s ears!
There would be a lot less doomsday cults in this world, if the book of Revelation had never made the cut, by Constantine and the council. Unfortunately for all of us adult survivors of apocalypses that never came, that wasn’t the case.
