When the weeping of the nations fills our hearts with holy dread, when a virus rings with pity those who cannot reach their dead, God is in our consternation, weeping by each sufferer’s bed. Distanced, lacking human comfort, no more in a mother’s arms, fearful faces peer through visors watching, even breathing harms, knowing only humane kindness brings the peace that heals, disarms. God bring strength in human weakness, give us grace that we might see through the mists of mortal blindness how to live through agony, how through quiet compassion, silence, we might mark our empathy. Andrew Pratt 31/12/2020 Words © 2021 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. Tune: PICARDY Metre: 87 87 87
Tag: comfort
Love matters for our future https://bramhallmethodists.org.uk/scienceandprayer/
Love matters for our future,
love founded in our past;
love woven through the present,
in hope that love will last.
This love is simply, human,
profoundly, love divine;
yet love can change another,
change lives like yours and mine
While we prefer the comfort
of minds akin to ours,
the gentle reassurance
of quiet refreshing hours;
in hell and not in heaven is
where the Christ is found,
the rough and trammeled pathway,
the trampled, bloodied ground.
But can we love another
and freely offer grace,
regardless of the neighbour
within our human race?
To always be uplifting,
to love and not condemn,
will model every person
as us and not as them.
Andrew Pratt 28/9/2019 – Science and the Language of Prayer. Written in response to Ruth Armstrong’s lecture. Seminar 1. Criminology.
Tune:AURELIA
Metre: 7.6.7.6D
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.
Jesus calls us to the chaos – hymn – ministry outside the camp
Jesus calls us to the chaos
that our hearts would fear to own,
places that are fraught and tortured,
only hurt and hatred known.
Jesus calls us to the desert,
wilderness of mental pain,
all perception seems distorted,
will we risk this stress and strain?
Jesus calls us out to meet him,
homeless, restless, lost alone,
all the future rung with sadness,
empty, heartless, cold as stone.
Jesus calls beyond the comfort
will the church stand still, or go?
Will we risk it, yet he beckons,
leave the safety that we know?
Andrew Pratt 21/3/2019
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.
Written for Peter Barber
hymnsandbooks 