Crafted from wood - a hymn on the cross – Luke 9:23; 14:27
Crafted from wood, the grain of our decision,
where faith was hung, a challenge to God’s love,
the Christ had carried it to execution,
this then our choice – the wing of hawk or dove?
Some made the choice that led to their extinction,
their’s was a loss, but not of love or grace,
accepting in each place of human crisis,
this challenge that each Christian has to face.
Take up your cross each day was Christ’s suggestion,
if you would follow in the path he trod,
yet we would minimise the resurrection,
that love transcending death can lead to God.
Words 2025 © 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: 11.10.11.10
Tune: O PERFECT LOVE (Barnby)
Some thoughts on this hymn to take us further.
I had in mind, as I wrote it:
Luke 9:23;14:27
23 Then he said to them all, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. (New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised)
14:27Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.
Also:
Søren Kierkegaard
In Kierkegaard's view, the Church should not try to prove Christianity or even defend it. It should help the single individual to make a leap of faith, the faith that God is love and has a task for that very same single individual. Kierkegaard identified the leap of faith as the good resolution. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%B8ren_Kierkegaard)
And
Dietrich Bonhoeffer ‘The Cost of Discipleship’ – Bonhoeffer stood against Fascism and was ultimately sent to a concentration camp and he was hanged on 9 April 1945 during the collapse of the Nazi regime.
All these point for me to Jesus’ words and how others have seen them and sought to live by them.
Category: Poems
As summer ends a hymn to challenge us – The Christ was a vagabond
As we begin (for Methodists, a new Methodist year this hymn challenges us, not to look at others, but to be honest about our own faithfulness to the example of Jesus.
The Christ was a vagabond, penniless stranger,
or so some would style him, deriding his call.
And those who would follow, were they any nearer
the total self-giving, of giving their all?
And we at this moment, are we any better?
Our silver excuses, have we got it right?
The poor are still with us? Then love of our neighbour
is vacuous, meaningless, blinding our sight.
The wealth of this nation is at our disposal,
yet few hold the purse strings, have power to decide,
while others are crippled. Iniquitous ‘sharing’
will leave them impoverished, nowhere to hide.
With wages and taxes we barter for people,
define what is poverty, pity the poor,
but then, when the homeless and helpless come knocking,
we bar them from pavements while locking the door.
We bathe in hypocrisy, claim to be righteous,
great God will you open our eyes to the plight
of those we have damaged, derided, diminished:
the Christ in the other, still hid from our sight.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
© 2017 Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Words © 2017 © 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: 12 11 12 11
Tune: STREETS OF LAREDO
Look! The love that was unspoken
Look! the love that was unspoken
Look! the love that was unspoken
shines with colour, power and light,
love that never can be broken
forging justice, putting right.
Here we live in grace and wonder owning God’s diversity.
Praising shards of light that glisten
with the truth that sets us free,
multitudes clasp hands of friendship,
all who claim humanity:
nothing can divert our purpose, one in our diversity.
All our art and music woven
with divinity and grace
has its origin, incarnate,
born within our human race,
disagreement cannot break our Spirit of diversity.
So the future opens for us:
galaxies beyond our glance,
bound forever to each other,
held by more than cosmic chance.
Nothing now will fault our spirit: CELEBRATE DIVERSITY!!!
Words © 2025 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: 87 87 87
Tune: WESTMINSTER ABBEY; RHUDDLAN
Words commissioned to celebrate PRIDE
‘Jesus’ open love would lead him’ – a hymn inspired by a healing on the Sabbath
Jesus' open love would lead him
The unexpected healing by Jesus on a Sabbath of a crippled, and hence alienated, woman inspired these words:
1 Jesus' open love would lead him
into conflict with the law.
People then, and now, believing,
they know wrong, of this they're sure.
2 Such aggressive condemnation:
not the way we should behave,
we have rules and regulations
plotting how our God can save.
3 These are rules that God has given,
rules that we must strive to keep,
yet it seems that Jesus challenged
norms that made the path too steep.
4 Rules he offered changed perceptions,
moved from punishment to grace,
showed a way of loving, living,
we might risk within this place.
5 Love beyond imagination,
love to heed and to enthral,
love not bounded by rejection,
love that reaches out to all.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2013 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 Trochaic
Tune: ST CATHERINE (Jones)
The Song of the Sea – a hymn related to Global Warming – reposting
The Song of the Sea – a hymn related to Global Warming
I usually post a hymn on a Monday or Tuesday each week. On Monday morning 11th August, the Today Programme on radio 4 announced that The UK's seas have had their warmest start to the year since records began, helping to drive some dramatic changes in marine life and for its fishing communities. Read more…
In 2021 Dr Tim Gordon Marine Biologist, Exeter University spoke to Bramhall Methodist Church about the death of coral reefs around Australia. Again, today there are reports of the deterioration of the Great Barrier Reef. During his seminar, in response, I wrote these words…
The song of the sea, once melodious, is dying,
that song is essential, the calling of home;
Great God, we lament, yet the sound of our crying
is quieter than breakers, the wash of the foam.
What work must we do to restore what is broken,
how can we encourage the choir of the sea?
The spirit is moving, the waters are wounded,
the oceans are anguished for life to be free.
You enter our suffering and love in our grieving,
you join us in weakness, when frailty is near,
God holds us, enfold us when hell overcomes us,
stand near to the tomb of our folly and fear.
You promise a covenant, both gift and promise.
Creation is groaning, still coming to birth.
Bring newness, renewal, a hope that is living,
from suffering bring joy for the whole of the earth.
We treasure the symphony, yet we are grieving,
we long for the chorus, the song of the sea,
bring light in the darkness and sound in the silence,
Great God, co-creator, let all life be free.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2021 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: 12 11 12 11
Tune: STREETS OF LAREDO
You can read more about this at Tim Gordon
Hear this sung by Gareth Moore here
hymnsandbooks 