In loudest songs thy joy declare

Verse 1
In loudest songs thy joy declare,
Thou barren church, that didst not bear,
Thine happy change with shoutings tell;
Beyond the ancient Israel bless’d,
Far more abundantly increas’d,
The widow doth the wife excel:

Verse 2
Inlarge thy dwelling-place, extend
Thy pale to earth’s remotest end,
Within no narrow bounds confin’d,
With cords of everlasting love,
With stakes of truth that cannot move,
Spread out thy tent for all mankind.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled “Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate, than the children of the married wife, saith the Lord, &c.”—[Isa.] liv. 1, 2. Introduced in Charles Wesley, Short Hymns on Select Passages of the Holy Scriptures, Vol. 1 (Bristol: Farley, 1762). Published in The Poetical Works of John and Charles Wesley, Collected and Arranged by G. Osborn, Vol. 9 (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Conference Office, 1870), page 439.

Publishing: Public Domain