Uncertainty of life by John Newton

See! another year is gone!

Quickly have the seasons passed!

This we enter now upon

May to many prove our last.

Mercy hitherto has spared,

But have mercies been improved?

Let us ask, am I prepared

Should I be this year removed?

Some we now no longer see,

Who their mortal race have run;

Seemed as fair for life as we,

When the former year begun;

Some, but who God only knows,

Who are here assembled now,

Ere the present year shall close,

To the stroke of death must bow.

Life a field of battle is,

Thousands fall within our view;

And the next death-bolt that flies,

May be sent to me or you:

While we preach, and while we hear,

Help us, Lord, each one, to think,

Vast eternity is near,

I am standing on the brink.

If from guilt and sin set free,

By the knowledge of Thy grace;

Welcome, then, the call will be

To depart and see Thy face:

To Thy saints, while here below,

With new years, new mercies come;

But the happiest year they know

Is their last, which leads them home.