Why hath God concealed the day

Verse 1
Why hath God conceal’d the day
When he will to judgment come?
That we every moment may
Stand prepar’d to meet our doom,
For the trumpet’s sound attend,
Watch to see our Judge descend.

Verse 2
Yet the curious pride of man
Dares into the secret pry,
Listens to predictions vain,
Dreams which give our God the lie,
Prophets who the day foreshow,
Tell what only God can know.

Verse 3
Them thy wrath, most righteous Lord,
To their own delusions leaves;
Every bold impostor’s word
Then th’ unstable souls deceives,
Doting, blind credulity
Plagues their unbelief of Thee.

Verse 4
Lord, from such we turn away,
Trust to be thro’ grace alone
Kept to that uncertain day,
To that awful hour unknown,
Following after righteousness,
Found at last in spotless peace.

Hymnal/Album: Originally titled: “‘But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels in heaven, but my Father only.’—[Matt. 24,] v. 36.” 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 376.
Publishing: Public Domain