Tag: calling

New Year hymn, a resolution, perhaps – Infectious faith

1	Infectious faith we demonstrate by action,  
	when words are lived and people feel God's grace,  
	when platitudes are kept in quiet abeyance,  
	and love expressed through every human face.  

2	This is the witness we are called to offer: 
	the smile of welcome and the touch of care,  
	when every neighbour frames the Christ we honour,  
	the angel that we're greeting unaware. 

3	My friend, we cannot claim to grace the Godhead 
	when those who stand in tatters at our door 
	are turned away without a moment's notice,  
	while others sleep upon a stone cold floor.  

4	Our faith and love are nothing, simply empty,  
	just words we fling against a cloud filled sky,  
	when those we see derided, disregarded, 
	are left, without our protest, just to die. 

5	Are we to be just noisy, clanging cymbals,  
	or signs of hope upon this cold, dark earth?  
	Ours is the calling now to re-imagine 
	the love of God, to sign each person's worth. 

Andrew E Pratt (born 1948) Words © 2016 © 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: INTERCESSOR

Hymn for Jesus Manifesto – Luke 4: 14 – 21

In Nazareth it happened,
folk heard with bated breath,
the good news Jesus offered 
of life instead of death.

This was the manifesto:
a charter for the poor,      
a welcome for the stranger 
who’d waited at the door.

Within a cell the captive 
would hear the freedom call,
and those who felt injustice
know healing was for all.

Oppression would be banished.
Yet hypocrites recoiled,
drove Jesus from their presence, 
but he would not be foiled.

And in this time and context 
will we still have to wait,
or dare we risk and follow, 
before it is too late?
Andrew Pratt 17/1/2022
Words © 2022 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
Tune: THE CHERRY TREE CAROL (repeat last two lines of each verse)
Based on Luke 4: 14 – 30 (the Lectionary for this coming Sunday is Luke 4: 14 – 21)
An alternative version below follows a slightly different rhythm.

Alternative words:

In Nazareth it happened,
the folk held their breath;
the good news Jesus offered 
was life instead of death.

And this was the promise:
a gift for the poor,      
a welcome for the stranger 
who’d waited at the door.

Within a cell the captive 
would hear freedom call,
and those who felt injustice
know healing was for all.

Oppression would be banished,
hypocrites recoiled,
drove Jesus from their presence, 
but he would not be foiled.

And in this time and context 
we still have to wait;
or dare we risk and follow, 
before it is too late?
Andrew Pratt 17/1/2022
Words © 2022 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,

The calling of Jesus bids us to build peace – vocation

The calling of Jesus bids us to build peace,
the time is this moment, to cease to deride
the weak and down-trodden the world might despise,
to bury  our prejudice, pack away pride.

The people are waiting God’s offer of love,
the different, disfigured, untutored or poor.
The grace of the God-head should not be confined,
how could we discard those who wait at our door?

While failing together we follow the Christ,
with ones deemed as worthless, as cruel or unkind,
as carrying our neighbours we cease to condemn,
while finding the heaven to which we’ve been blind.
Andrew Pratt 18/10/2019

Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://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.
Tunes: DATCHET