Up to you I lift my eyes
Psalm 123

   'Up to you I lift my eyes' is a hymn paraphrase of Psalm 123, which I wrote in 1984 after listening to a recorded talk on that psalm with its encouragement to watch for God's hand in our lives. I was reminded of Archbishop Janani Luwum of Uganda, who, when he was arrested and soon to be martyred, waved goodbye to his startled fellow-bishops and beamed reassuringly. His words went something like, ‘Don’t worry: I can see the Lord's hand in this.’

   Gill Berry composed the tune 'ASHES HOLLOW' hymn in 1998, and that 5-verse setting was one of the hymns chosen to be sung at the launch of the hymn-book "Praise!" in London in May 2000.

    In 2011 the paraphrase was selected for ‘Psalms for all seasons’, to be published in 2012 by ‘’Faith Alive Christian Resources’, Grand Rapids, Michigan. The tune chosen on that occasion was THE CALL by Vaughan Williams, and to fit this pairing a revision of the final verse was requested – and at that point the original 5 verses were compacted to 4. It was also suggested that I might change the first word from ‘Though’ to ‘When’, and in that way open the psalm up more broadly “to both those who currently are being despised by the proud, and those who might not sense such abuse, but one day will." (Martin Tel). I was glad of this advice, which I have taken since then as an important guideline in approaching such paraphrases as this one.