Easter morning hymn - Such shock had greeted women
1 Such shock had greeted women
arriving at the tomb;
the place was stark and empty.
Was this a stone-cold womb?
A second life had beckoned
the body, come and gone.
Yet Mary stood there weeping,
warmed by the rising sun.
2 Long shadows greeted mourning,
the light could trick and turn;
a gardener was waiting,
she struggled to discern;
reality was breaking,
denying common sense,
for Jesus offered greeting,
there, in the present tense.
3 And others met this Jesus,
each heard a different call,
two thousand years thereafter
God seeks to meet us all.
The spirit is God’s presence,
that spirit meets our need
as love is planted in us,
a quietly growing seed.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2020 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 7 6 7 6 D
Tune: PASSION CHORALE
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God hung and died upon the cross
God hung and died upon the cross
God hung and died upon the cross,
and there he suffered wild abuse,
the ones who held religious power
had offered an oblique excuse:
denying love their greatest crime.
We see this echoed in our time.
For when we worship week by week
while poor are trampled, made more poor;
when those in need are turned away,
or sent off to another shore;
our silence signs complicity
and signals our iniquity.
But if we walk beside the ones
that others curse, berate and blame,
share in their stark reality,
their ridicule, pernicious pain;
then know that God has walked this way,
with them we'll live another day.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948) based on 1 Peter 2: 19-25
© 2015 © Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk .
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your
CCL Licence returns.
All wider and any commercial use requires prior application
to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Metre: 8 8 8 8 8 8
Tune: ABINGDON
There are no limits to God’s love
1 There are no limits to God’s love,
aside from those we put in place
because of fear, or hate or greed,
then justified by race or creed.
2 The walls that we would seek to build,
around our nations or our thoughts ,
the borders we patrol and police,
are breached by God’s own grace and peace.
3 The ones we would exclude or hurt
are fellow children on this earth,
are sisters, brothers, all of worth,
and sharing human life and birth.
4 Beyond our earthly thoughts and ways,
transcending barriers we erect,
there is not one beyond God’s grace,
all should be welcome in this place.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
© 2013 Stainer and Bell Ltd.
LM
How soon Palm Sunday prayers and praise – a Palm Sunday hymn
How soon Palm Sunday prayers and praise – a Palm Sunday hymn
1 How soon Palm Sunday prayers and praise,
that could have held love's fusion,
were spun around: the same ones cried
aloud for execution.
2 Such loud hosannas! Yet our praise
has many different faces;
how soon our love is turned around,
we lose our airs and graces.
3 And see how those who waved their palms
with shouts of exaltation
at once had changed both minds and ways
to bless annihilation.
4 How soon commitment melts or fades,
and hope becomes illusion;
and so our love transmutes to hate,
our order to confusion.
5 God help us at this present time
to act without pretension,
to hold on fast to gracious love,
to live out your intention.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2015 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 8 7 8 7
Tune: DOMINUS REGIT ME
‘Right here in the presence of loving and grace’ – a hymn inspired by Mary anointing Jesus’s feet.
‘Right here in the presence of loving and grace’ – a hymn inspired by Mary anointing Jesus's feet.
1 Right here in the presence of loving and grace,
see Judas is scowling, a sneer scars his face.
Anointing with perfume is costly and rare;
this gift could be sold, giving substance to care.
2 What need this affection that Jesus received?
It seemed to go counter to all they believed.
The sale of the perfume could go in the purse,
some pieces of silver, not seen as a curse.
3 Yet this would foreshadow for Judas and Christ,
a scene of betrayal, for greed had enticed
this zealot to grasp for much more than his lot,
through misunderstanding, he'd scheme and he'd plot.
4 For Jesus, anointing would speak of his death,
as love of humanity took his last breath,
but now in this moment a woman knelt down,
her wisdom, perception, would lead to a crown.
5 This act of extravagance, worldly yet wise,
offensive to some, was now opening eyes
to love without measure, to infinite grace,
that minds cannot fathom, nor custom displace.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
© 2015 Stainer & Bell Ltd., London, England, www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Metre: 11 11 11 11
Tune: ST DENIO
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