Poetry · Chapter
Come to Me explained
A speaker earnestly prays for God's presence in all of nature, expressing doubt about God's nearness and longing for the certainty of faith that ancient believers possessed.
What happens
A speaker earnestly prays for God's presence in all of nature, expressing doubt about God's nearness and longing for the certainty of faith that ancient believers possessed. The speaker resolves to follow Christ's teachings in order to regain that old faith and know God's fatherhood.
Themes in this chapter
Spiritual Struggle and Doubt
The speaker openly questions God's presence and the certainty of faith, contrasting past believers with modern skepticism.
Divine Fatherhood
The poem concludes with the hope of knowing God as Father through obedience to Christ.
Characters to notice
- Unknown
The speaker who prays and wrestles with doubt.
- God
The divine being the speaker longs for.
- Jesus Christ
Referred to as 'he' who taught that doing his word leads to knowledge of truth.
Key passages
“Come to me, come to me, O my God; Come to me everywhere! Let the trees mean thee, and the grassy sod, And the water and the air!”
I beg you, God, to be present in every part of nature around me.
The speaker desires a tangible, immanent experience of the divine in the natural world.
“For thou art so far that I often doubt, As on every side I stare, Searching within, and looking without, If thou canst be anywhere.”
You seem so distant that I frequently question whether you exist at all, as I search both inside myself and in the world around me.
This expresses the core spiritual doubt that pervades the poem.
“But he taught that they who did his word The truth of it sure would know: I will try to do it: if he be lord Again the old faith will glow;”
Christ promised that those who follow his teachings will know the truth. I will attempt to obey him, and if he is truly Lord, my former faith will be rekindled.
The speaker resolves to act on faith as a path to certainty.