Captain, God of my salvation

Verse 1
Captain, God of my salvation,
How shall I thy word obey,
Prest, surrounded with temptation,
Wanting power to watch and pray?
Humbly I implore the blessing,
Watching, supplicating power;
Fill my heart with prayer unceasing,
Wake my soul to sleep no more.

Verse 2
Set my soul upon the tower,
While the world and sin are nigh,
Thro’ the dark, distressing hour
Hear me in thy Spirit cry:
Satan still desires to have me;
Lord, thy ransom’d servant take,
Save, and every moment save me,
For thy truth and mercy sake.

Verse 3
If I have with God found favor
Thro’ thy cries on Calvary,
Day and night my constant Saviour
Stand betwixt my heart and me;
If on Thee I boldly venture,
Thou my tempted soul restrain,
That the snare I may not enter,
May not close with sin again.

Verse 4
Awed by thy continual presence
Give me still on Thee t’ attend,
Kept in faithful acquiescence,
Praying, watching to the end;
Till in life’s extreme temptation
Calm I lay my burthen down,
Sink a partner of thy passion,
Rise a sharer of thy throne.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation.” ’—Matt. 26, v. 41.” This hymn appears in the 1766 manuscript “MS Matthew.” This manuscript is part of the collection of the Methodist Archive and Research Centre in The John Rylands Library, The University of Manchester (accession number MA 1977/577, Charles Wesley Notebooks Box 3). Accessed through the website of The Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition, Duke Divinity School. Published in The Poetical Works of John and Charles Wesley, Collected and Arranged by G. Osborn, Vol. 10 (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Conference Office, 1870), page 404.
Publishing: Public Domain