Category: Poems

Nicodemus meets Jesus, a hymn

This coming Sunday (Lent 2) one of the gospel readings is John 3: 1 – 17 it is the account of Nicodemus visiting Jesus. This hymn reflects on that.

1          The riddle of salvation,
            not of a cross or tomb,
            confronted Nicodemus
            within a quiet room.
            Christ took him back to childhood,
            and challenged all he knew,
            his intellect was tested
            by hearing what to do.
           
2          ‘To reach the end you hope for
            you must be born again’.
            He looked uncomprehending,
            and wondered, was this sane?
            But Jesus answered gently,
            ‘you have your life and worth,
            another change is called for,
            just like a second birth’.
           
3          The change that he was facing
            would turn his life around,
            that was the riddle’s answer,
            what he had sought he found.
            The life that Jesus offered
            required a different frame,
            and from that moment forward,
            he’d never be the same.
           
4          And now that call still echoes
            in every place and time,
            the movement of God’s dancing,
            the rhythm and the rhyme
            disrupt and change, transform us,
            move to another plain,             
            and those who follow Jesus
            will never be the same.

Andrew Pratt (born 1948) based on John 3 vs 1-17 Nicodemus

Words © 2011 © 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
THORNBURY; WOLVERCOTE

A Hymn for the Beginning of Lent – Jesus’ temptation

A Hymn for the beginning of Lent – Jesus’ temptation

Wild wilderness, pathetic desolation, 
as Jesus walked, then rested for the night, 
for forty days his strength was tried and tested, 
for forty days he sifted wrong and right.
	
He woke to hunger tangled in his being, 
what miracle might turn these stones to bread? 
But God within the centre of his spirit
was food enough to keep his body fed. 
	
His faith was such that it could move a mountain 
and God could save him from the greatest fall. 
But faith like this need not be tried or tested;
the love of God will never slip or stall.
	
He climbed the mountain, saw the world in splendour, 
then thought of ruling all his eyes could see; 	
yet power like this was not the thing he needed -
devoid of wealth he'd set the people free. 
	
Beyond temptation love would live incarnate, 
his human flesh would laugh and cry and weep, 
in Christ God's love and grace would not diminish, 
dynamic love would never die nor sleep.

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: SM
Metre: 11 10 11 10
Tune: INTERCESSOR

A still small voice, the crumbling earth lies silent – a poem after a devastating earthquake.

A still small voice, the crumbling earth lies silent  - a poem after a devastating earthquake. 

A still small voice, the crumbling earth lies silent, 
a baby suckled at her mother’s breast, 
feels flesh grow cool as she lies quietly dying, 
no comfort now, no warmth, no earthly rest. 

And where is God amid this dust, these ashes? 
Is this God’s plan, this random, rancid death? 
Where is the blessing in these crumbling buildings 
where silent bodies drew a final breath? 

The dust, a pall, obscures the teasing sunrise. 
See, dawn’s temptation to arise, to wake. 
But this dishonest call is, empty, hollow 
to any who’ve survived this this night, this quake. 

What now? The still, small voice still quietly questions: 
there is no consolation for this pain, 
but mid the dust and rubble of this carnage, 
humanity might rise in hope again.
©Andrew Pratt 7/2/2023

The day after the earthquakes in Turkey, Syria and the surrounding regions.









Tectonic plates beneath this rock hard surface -the Turkish-Syrian earthquakes 2023

1	Tectonic plates beneath this rock hard surface, 

	uplifted, twisting life and limb and steel. 

	The landscape that was home has lost its features, 

	destruction means that few are left to heal. 

	

2	An empty chair amid such devastation 

	where cars like toys, are lifted, spun about;

	and here we wait and pray in helpless anguish; 

	and 'where is God' we want to cry and shout.

	

3	Incarnate God we need your present spirit 

	to live within your people at this time, 

	to energise our prayerful words and action, 

	to offer grace to life's discordant rhyme.

	

4	God offer hope to those who feel forsaken, 

	to those whose lives have spun and turned around; 

	to those whose grief defies all consolation, 

	bring grace and love and hope and solid ground.



Andrew Pratt (born 1948)

© 2011 Stainer & Bell Ltd. Alt 6/2/2023 by the author.

11 10 11 10

Tunes: INTERCESSOR; LORD OF THE YEARS
On the day of the earthquakes in Turkey, Syria and the surrounding areas.

Earthquake- iPad art (c) Andrew Pratt 2023

The Beatitudes – a hymn – A contradictory blessing

The Beatitudes - A contradictory blessing

The gospel reading appointed for this coming Sunday, Matthew 5:1-12, is known as the Beatitudes. The following hymn was inspired by this passage:

1	A contradictory blessing 
	of those who feel unblessed,
	when life is torn and twisted
	for this to be redressed; 
	a time of reparation 
	and yet a time for grace 
	when those who feel forsaken 
	will meet God face to face.
	
2	And in that time of meeting, 
	the hurt will find new joy, 
	the poor will welcome riches, 
	more than they could deploy; 
	the mourning will find comfort, 
	the lost will see God's light 
	to bring them to the dawning, 
	beyond their darkest night.
	
3	The ones who ache with hunger 
	will share a glorious feast,
	and those reviled and hated 
	will find they are released.
	The gentle will inherit 
	the greatest gift of all,
	while rafters ring with laughter
	where crying filled the hall.

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: 7 6 7 6 D
Tune: THORNBURY