Asleep in Jesus! blessed sleep

Composed by Margaret Mackay, this burial hymn was first published in The Amethyst; or Christian's Annual for 1832, edited by Dr. Richard Huie and Dr. Robert Kaye Greville. The poem was introduced in the publication under the title "Sleeping in Jesus" by Mrs. Mackay of Hedgefield, accompanied by a note explaining that the verses were inspired by a simple epitaph seen on a tombstone in a rural Devonshire churchyard. When reprinting the hymn in her volume Thoughts Redeemed in 1854, Mrs. Mackay identified the location as Pennycross Chapel, noting how the quiet rural surroundings of the chapel, reached through green lanes near a busy seaport, made the phrase "Sleeping in Jesus" feel remarkably fitting.

Structured in six stanzas of four lines, the hymn gained rapid popularity across Great Britain and North America for its comforting view of Christian death. It was included in full and without alteration in the Scottish Presbyterian Hymnal (1876) and the Free Church Hymn Book (1882). In 1882, Godfrey Thring created a composite text in his collection by combining Mrs. Mackay's first stanza with five stanzas from his own hymn on the same theme, though this version remained unique to his collection.