No, not a diet of bones, but of Bonars, Horatius Bonars, that is. Horatius Bonar’s hymns are some of the most beloved songs that we find in our hymnals and in our repertoire of evangelical singing. A congregation will be well fed on a diet of the great truths he has so wonderfully expressed in his hymn texts. In the British Isles and in America, it would not be difficult to identify nearly 100 of his hymns that continue in use today. These would include “O Love of God, How Strong and True;” “Blessing and Honor and Glory and Power;” “I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say;” “Here, O My Lord, I See Thee Face to Face;” “Not What My Hands Have Done;” “I Was a Wandering Sheep;” “No, Not Despairingly Come I to Thee;” “Thy Works, Not Mine, O Christ;” “A Few More Years Shall Roll;” “Go, Labor On;” “Fill Thou My Life, O Lord My God;” “When the Weary Seeking Rest;” and “Thy Way, Not Mine, O Lord.”
Bonar’s hymns and poems were composed amid a great variety of circumstances. His scholarship is thorough and extensive, in the doctrines of evangelical Calvinism and the devotional insights for godly living as well as with the excellencies of 19th century literary expression. They breathe the atmosphere of evangelistic passion, exalting Jesus’ redeeming work as he holds out the gospel invitation for sinners to come to the Savior for forgiveness and eternal life. His poems display the grace of style and wealth of allusion which are the fruit of ripe culture. He is especially remembered for his habitual contemplation of the Second Advent as the future era of this world’s true bliss. His hymns and poems are distinguished by a tone of pensive reflection, facing the reality of sin in the world and in the heart. But they are more substantial than the mere record of emotion.
Another element is supplied by his intellectual and personal grasp of the truths of redemption, and these truths particularly: the gift of a Substitute, our blessed Savior; divine grace, righteous, yet free and universal in offer; the duty of immediate reliance upon the privilege of immediate assurance through that grace; communion with God, especially in the Lord’s Supper, respecting which he insists on the privilege of cherishing the highest conceptions which Scripture warrants; and finally, the Second Advent of our Lord. By his vigorous celebration of these and other truths as the source and strength of spiritual life, his hymns are protected from the blight of unhealthy, shallow emotional introspection. They are solidly grounded, not in feeble sentimentality, but in stable truths and historical realities.
One 19th century writer has summed up Bonar’s hymns with these words.
Dr. Bonar’s hymns satisfy the fastidious by their instinctive good taste; they mirror the life of Christ in the soul, partially, perhaps, but with vivid accuracy; they win the heart by their tone of tender sympathy; they sing the truth of God in ringing notes; and although, when taken as a whole, they are not perfect; although, in reading them, we meet with feeble stanzas, halting rhythm, defective rhyme, meaningless iteration; yet a singularly large number have been stamped with approval, both in literary circles and by the Church.
One of the finest of Bonar’s 600 hymns is believed to have been his first, “I Lay My Sins on Jesus.” The theme of the hymn addresses the number one problem facing every individual in the human race today, and in every age. It’s not foreign aggression or carcinogens or economic stagnation or climate change. It’s sin, and how it has polluted our lives, leading us into every kind of misery and sadness which we experience in this fallen world. It’s our guilt before a holy God. It’s the hell that awaits us as the punishment we deserve for our deep-seated treasonous rebellion against our Creator. What can we do about our sin? The Bible’s answer comes through beautifully in Bonar’s hymn. “I Lay My Sins on Jesus.”
This is consistent with one of his prominent themes, that of the righteousness of Christ which is imputed to us for our salvation. For Bonar, these texts were a reflection of his heart, a heart that was enamored with love for Jesus at the same time his mind was thrilled at the doctrines of justification. It results in a degree of joy and peace for the Christian life that we should all desire, and which we can all enjoy through faith in Jesus. When we come to Him, our sins are laid on Him, as “He who knew no sin became sin for us” (2 Corinthians 5:21). In the deepest sense, according to Isaiah 53:6, it was not us, but the Father who laid our sins on Jesus. But because of that, we have the responsibility to act on that and consciously lay our sins on Jesus ourselves. And that is what Bonar has written.
In the progression of stanzas, Bonar looks at the larger picture of what Jesus has done for us, as we lay each of these things on Him: our sins, our wants, and our souls, concluding with the longing of our hearts to be like Him. While he doesn’t mention it, we can’t help but remember Jesus’ words of invitation in Matthew 11:28, “Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
In stanza 1, we start with our greatest need, freedom from our sins, and the guilt which hangs over our heads. What does it mean to “lay” them on Jesus? It means to acknowledge that we are sinners and can do nothing to save ourselves. It means to recognize that we are deserving of God’s eternal wrath and punishment. So to “lay” these sins on Jesus is to turn them over to Him, so that He is regarded as if the sins were His. He “bears them all” and by His death on the cross as our substitute pays the penalty we owed, thereby washing away our “crimson stains” so that we are set free.
I lay my sins on Jesus, The spotless Lamb of God;
He bears them all and frees us From the accursed load.
I bring my guilt to Jesus To wash my crimson stains
White in His blood most precious Till not a spot remains.
In stanza 2, we proceed to the limitless body of “wants” that sin has produced in our lives. Turning from God and His laws, we have followed the paths we desired, plummeting further and further from Him until He rescues us and begins that work of renewal that will only be completed in glory. Until then, we come to Him every day with our diseases, our bondage, our griefs, our burdens, and our cares. They are overwhelming in number and in weight. But when we lay them on Him, the one in whom “all fulness dwells” (Colossians 2:9), He releases us. More than that, He shares our sorrows as one who lived under the law (Galatians 4:4), being tempted in every way like us (Hebrews 4:14). While we will not enjoy the fulness of this deliverance until glory, we can know increasing measures of this daily as we live close to Him, laying all these weights on Him, knowing that He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7).
I lay my wants on Jesus, All fulness dwells in Him;
He healeth my diseases, He doth my soul redeem.
I lay my griefs on Jesus, My burdens and my cares;
He from them all releases, He all my sorrows shares.
In stanza 3, we act on the larger spiritual issues experienced by our weary souls, exactly what Jesus had in mind in that invitation in Matthew 11 about laboring and being heavy laden. That brings to mind all the cares and worries and anxieties that build up day by day as we strive to keep ourselves from the temptations brought on by the world, the flesh, and the devil. Instead of being weighed down with those, we can rest our weary souls on Jesus. Bonar’s text pictures us reclining on His breast, feeling His powerful right hand embracing us, holding us tightly. What a beautiful expression then follows. “I love the name of Jesus, Immanuel, Christ the Lord.” It may seem old-fashioned, but isn’t it wonderful to think of the name of Jesus being poured out “like fragrance on the breezes?”
I rest my soul on Jesus, This weary soul of mine;
His right hand me embraces, I on His breast recline.
I love the name of Jesus, Immanuel, Christ the Lord;
Like fragrance on the breezes His name abroad is poured.
In stanza 4, we conclude with the central longing of the heart, “to be like Jesus.” And this is not so much because of what that will do for us, as it is for the joy it will bring to Him. This is also the longing of our hearts to be with Him, a desire that will at last be granted when we are finally home with Him, singing “with saints His praises.” Here is a measure to gauge the condition of our spiritual passion. Shouldn’t this be a description of what we most long for each day?
I long to be like Jesus, Meek, loving, lowly, mild;
I long to be like Jesus, The Father’s holy Child.
I long to be with Jesus Amid the heavenly throng
To sing with saints His praises, To learn the angels’ song.
To sum it all up, we should each ask ourselves, “What have I done with my sins?” Am I hoping to atone for them on my own by living a good life, rejecting the offer Jesus makes to me? Am I ignoring them, hoping God will forget about them? Am I continuing to carry the weight and guilt, with all of that pressure building up on top of my soul, stealing joy and peace from my guilt-ridden heart? Or have I laid my sins on Jesus, and found Him to be the savior of my life, the lover of my soul?
There have been several tunes associate with the text over the years, including tune AURELIA, with which we sing “The Church’s One Foundation.” Others include COMMEMORATION and CALCUTTA.
Here is a recording of the first three stanzas of the hymn.