What is the origin of the term 'going to wrack and ruin'?

'Wrack' refers to wreckage, vengeance and retributive punishment. From looking at its copious entry in the OED it is clear that the word 'wrack' has had a considerable history. But other than for this expression it seems to have disappeared from use. Is anyone able to contradict this?

"Rack is a variant of the now defunct word wrack, more usually known to us now as wreck." source Wrack (as wreck) was used as early as 1548, in a sermon by Ephraim Udall:

"The flocke goeth to wrecke and vtterly perisheth." Henry Bull moved the phrase on to 'wrack and ruin' in his translation of Luther's Commentarie upon the fiftene psalmes, 1577:

"Whiles all things seeme to fall to wracke and ruine."

However

"The noun wrack means ruin or destruction, and generally is confined to the phrase wrack and ruin and wracked with doubt (or pain). The verb wrack has substantially the same meaning as the verb rack, the latter being preferred." (The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law 2011. Associated Press, 2011)

"Penny was wracked with sorrow for his friends." (Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings)

"It is early afternoon; a mother prepares her warrior son's torn body for burial. His father is wracked with sorrow, he is going through his belongings..." Angelika Bammer (1994)

"Again and again, the woman would return to the last painful moments until she was once more wracked with sorrow." Thomas Goodrich (2005)

"So when the psalmist cannot connect with God, and when the psalmist is wracked with doubt about God's gracious presence in his life, what then?" John D. Suk (2011)