They were travelling to the New World when an Atlantic storm threatened to capsize their ship. Waves crashed over the deck and split the main sail. John and Charles Wesley (1707-1788) were traveling to Georgia as Anglican missionaries. Moravians from Germany (modern day Czech Republic) were also on board. While the English travelers went into full panic mode, the Moravians went right on singing. John Wesley later questioned a Moravian if he was afraid. “I thank God, no.” Wesley asked, “But were your women and children afraid?” “No,” he said, “our women and children are not afraid to die.” John Wesley wrote in his journal, “This is the most glorious day I have ever seen.”
The Wesley brothers arrived in Georgia, but Charles lasted only four months before returning to England to begin a prodigious hymn-writing ministry. On the day of his conversion in 1738, he opened his Bible to Psalm 40, “He put a new song in my mouth. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord.” Charles wrote sixty-five hundred hymns over his lifetime, including “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling.” This trinitarian hymn praises Jesus as the expression of God’s love in verse one, the Holy Spirit as our sanctifier in verse two, and the Father as the source of life in verse three. The hymn is filled with Biblical imagery. The references to Jesus as Alpha and Omega and casting our crowns before him are drawn from Revelation. The words, “changed from glory into glory” are a direct quote from 2 Corinthians. John Dryden, a contemporary of Wesley, composed a poem with the opening words, “Farthest Isle, all Isles excelling.” Wesley played off John Dryden’s words in his hymn’s opening line, “Love divine, all loves excelling. While the goddess Venus chose the Isle of Britain in John Dryden’s poem, God chose the human heart as his dwelling place in Charles’ hymn. Today’s prayer asks God in divine love: “to fix in us thy humble dwelling…to enter every trembling heart…to visit us with thy salvation…to take away the love of sinning…to set our hearts at liberty.”