Clasping of hands
Restored Through Belonging
The soul declares that belonging to God restores true self-possession, while attempting self-possession apart from God leads to loss.
Lord, you are mine, and I am yours—if I am mine at all. And I am yours far more than I, or anything, am or can be mine.1 Yet being yours restores me, so that I am mine again now, and mine with even greater advantage: since this being mine brings yours with it, and with me you restore yourself. If I were to be mine without you, I would be neither mine nor yours.
The Deepening of Union
The soul renews its claim of mutual belonging, grounds it in Christ's redemptive suffering, and prays for an ever-deepening union that transcends the very distinction of 'yours' and 'mine'.
Lord, I am yours, and you are mine: so completely mine that I may presume you are more mine than your own.2 For you suffered to restore not yourself, but me, and to be mine: and mine with still greater advantage, since in death you were none of your own, yet then, as mine, you restored me.3 O stay mine still! Keep making me yours! Or rather, make no 'yours' and 'mine'!4
Read the original English
Lord, thou art mine, and I am thine, If mine I am: and thine much more, Then I or ought, or can be mine. Yet to be thine, doth me restore; So that again I now am mine, And with advantage mine the more: Since this being mine, brings with it thine, And thou with me dost thee restore. If I without thee would be mine, I neither should be mine nor thine.
Lord, I am thine, and thou art mine: So mine thou art, that something more I may presume thee mine, then thine. For thou didst suffer to restore Not thee, but me, and to be mine: And with advantage mine the more, Since thou in death wast none of thine, Yet then as mine didst me restore. O be mine still! still make me thine! Or rather make no Thine and Mine!
Notes
- 1 ↩Source 'Then' is the period spelling of comparative 'than' (not temporal 'then'); 'ought' is 'aught' (anything).
- 2 ↩Source 'then' is early-modern spelling of 'than' (comparison), not temporal 'then'.
- 3 ↩'none of thine' / 'none of your own' means Christ in death did not keep himself for himself; he was wholly given over, and in that self-emptying restored the speaker as belonging to him.
- 4 ↩Capitalized 'Thine and Mine' name the possessive categories themselves; the petition asks God to dissolve the dual claim of ownership into undivided belonging.
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