Obe Adare Ehemay Lyrics by Rev. Fr Kalana Peiris

You are the one who made the sun and moon,
you are the great ruler of all,
you are the one who died for my sake,
your love, it is just like that

Higher than the sky above,
deeper than the depths below,
softer than the breeze,
your love, it is just like that

In that love I lay down my rest,
Jesus is the only thing I truly own

Close beside me like a mother,
protecting like a father,
steady and sure like a friend,
your love, it is just like that

It always defeats my sin,
it forgives me where I have erred,
it does not scold me when I fall,
your love, it is just like that

In that love I lay down my rest,
Jesus is the only thing I truly own

It treasures the good in me,
it does not throw away my faults,
it values me just as I am,
your love, it is just like that

A sweet embrace when I am near,
it endures when I go away,
it welcomes me when I return,
your love, it is just like that

In that love I lay down my rest,
Jesus is the only thing I truly own

This is a hymn that does one thing beautifully: it describes the love of God from every angle it can find, and after each description it simply marvels, “your love, it is just like that.” It begins with the sheer scale of who this loving God is, “you made the sun and moon,” “the great ruler of all,” and then, in the same breath, “you died for my sake.” The wonder is that such greatness would also stoop to die for one person. The love is then measured in impossible dimensions, “higher than the sky, deeper than the depths, softer than the breeze.”

The middle verses bring that vast love down into the shapes we know best. It is “close beside me like a mother, protecting like a father, steady like a friend,” all the safest human loves gathered into one. And crucially, it is a love that keeps loving through failure: “it always defeats my sin, it forgives me where I have erred, it does not scold me when I fall.” This is grace, not scorekeeping.

The most touching lines describe how this love treats a flawed person. “It treasures the good in me, it does not throw away my faults, it values me just as I am.” And in an unmistakable echo of Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son, “it endures when I go away, it welcomes me when I return.” Between each verse the singer rests in it all, “in that love I lay down my rest, Jesus is the only thing I truly own.” What the listener is left with is an unhurried, grateful portrait of grace, a love vast as the heavens and tender as a mother, that never gives up on the one it loves.