Lyrics
Verse 1
Come, thou omniscient Son of man,
Display thy sifting power;
Come with thy Spirit's winnowing fan,
And throughly purge thy floor.
Verse 2
The chaff of sin, the accursed thing,
Far from our souls be driven!
The wheat into thy garner bring,
And lay us up for heaven.
Verse 3
Look through us with thy eyes of flame,
The clouds and darkness chase;
And tell me what by sin I am,
And what I am by grace.
Verse 4
Whate'er offends thy glorious eyes,
Far from our hearts remove;
As dust before the whirlwind flies,
Disperse it by thy love.
Verse 5
Then let us all thy fulness know,
From every sin set free;
Saved, to the utmost saved below,
And perfectly like thee.
Meaning & Inspiration
"Come, Thou Omniscient Son of Man" addresses Christ directly as all-knowing, asking him to exercise a "sifting power" pictured through the agricultural image of winnowing, separating wheat from chaff on a threshing floor. That extended metaphor, drawn from ancient farming practice, frames sin as something to be separated out and discarded rather than merely acknowledged.
Its middle verses shift from agricultural imagery to direct self-examination, asking Christ to look through the singer "with eyes of flame" and reveal the difference between sinful nature and what grace can accomplish. That request for exposure rather than concealment marks the hymn's central movement, inviting scrutiny as the necessary path toward purification.
The closing verses move toward resolution, asking for complete freedom from sin and a final likeness to Christ himself. Written in the eighteenth-century Methodist hymn tradition, the hymn functions as a prayer of self-examination and sanctification, its winnowing imagery giving concrete shape to an otherwise abstract request for inward purity.
Related Scripture
- Matthew 3:12 Describes Christ's winnowing fan clearing the threshing floor, directly echoed in the hymn's opening image.
- Malachi 3:2-3 Describes God refining and purifying like a refiner's fire, echoed in the hymn's request for purging and purification.