“In This Time of Great Reflection” is a hymn that lifts up the theme of the Puritan John Winthrop’s 1630 sermon, “A Model of Christian Charity.” Winthrop talked about the Massachusetts Bay Colony as “a city on a hill,” referencing Jesus’ image from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:14. In his use of this phrase, Winthrop wasn’t giving a sermon about American exceptionalism, as some later historical figures have suggested. As historian Daniel T. Rodgers explains in As a City on a Hill: The Story of America’s Most Famous Lay Sermon, Winthrop was actually delivering a warning: The eyes of the world would be on Massachusetts Bay to see if the colony would morally succeed in being loving, just, humble, good, neighborly, and kind.
This hymn is a prayer that, as we reflect on our nation’s 250th anniversary, we will strive to be a morally responsible and community-building people; that we will repent of our sins and become as loving and humble as God is calling us to be.
The hymn’s tune, “Restoration” (most often used for “Come, Ye Sinners, Poor and Needy”), is a 19th-century American folk tune, as is the alternate tune, “Holy Manna.” Both tunes come from the American shape-note tradition. (See printable version here.)
In This Time of Great Reflection
RESTORATION 8.7.8.7D (“Come, Ye Sinners, Poor and Needy”)
In this time of great reflection on two hundred fifty years,
We remember, as a nation, times we’ve prospered, times of tears.
“We shall be,” a preacher told us, “as a city on a hill”—
not to praise us but to warn us: We’ve a duty to fulfill.
Here is what holds us together: Mercy, love, community.
We’re to seek to care for neighbors in a just society.
If we fail to help the needy and to build a land that’s just,
we will simply be a by-word as the world looks on at us.
We recall our nation’s story. Keep us honest, God above!
In our quest for wealth and glory, we have injured ones you love.
Through enslavement, through displacement, we have chosen ways of sin.
We’ve been violent. We’ve stayed silent. So our light of love stays dim.
Will we work for racial justice? Will we turn from fear and hate?
What is now the public witness that you call us to create?
As we celebrate our country, help us, Lord, to understand:
All of us must share the bounty and the goodness of the land.
In this time, O God, restore us to the land we’re called to be—
where all people here among us know your blest community.
May we seek to be that city, not with pride but as a prayer.
May we love and serve you humbly, in our land and everywhere.
Tune: RESTORATION, Walker’s Southern Harmony, 1835
Alternative Tune: HOLY MANNA, William Moore’s Columbian Harmony, 1825
Text: Copyright © 2026 by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette. All rights reserved.
Author’s note: Thank you to three historians who offered helpful insights and feedback in the creation of this hymn; all three have expertise in American history and are active in their church’s music programs: Frederick J. Heuser, the retired executive director of the Presbyterian Historical Society; Andrew Robertson, associate professor of history at Lehman College of the City University; and Wendy Wall, associate professor of history at Binghamton University.
Editor’s note: If your church sings this hymn, we’d love to hear about it! Email us at [email protected].
Carolyn Winfrey Gillette is the author of over 550 hymns that have been sung by thousands of congregations around the world and are found in over 20 books and thousands of websites, including carolynshymns.com.
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