His Place Ours, in Heaven or on Earth

One place have I in heaven above,
The glory of His throne;
On this dark earth, whence He is gone,
I have one place alone.
And if His throne in heaven I know,
I joy to find His path below.
We meet to own that place alone,
Around the broken bread;
The “dead” whose life is hid with Christ,
Remembering Jesus dead.
For us is quench’d all earthly light;
Above, the glory—here, the night.
Dear as the place beside Him there,
His footsteps here below,
Where He has gone thro’ scorn and ·wrong,
There also would I go.
Lord, where Thou diedst I would die;
For where Thou livest there am I.
One lonely path across· the waste
Thy lowly path of shame;
I would adore Thy wondrous grace,
That I should tread the same.
The stranger and the alien Thou
And I the stranger, alien, now.
Thy cross a mighty barrier stands
Between the world and me:
Not yielding with reluctant hands,
But glorying to be free
From that which now is dung and dross
Beside Thy glory and Thy cross.
I see Him there amidst the light,
The Father’s blessed Son,
I know that I am with Him there,
That light and love my own.
What has this barren world to give,
If there in His deep joy I live?
Sent hither from that glorious home,
As He was sent before,
Of that great love from whence I come,
To witness evermore.
For this would I count all things loss
His joy, His glory, and His cross.