Tag: crucifixion

How can God, condemned, be hanging? – the test of all that deserves to be called Christian…

How can God, condemned, be hanging? – the test of all that deserves to be called  Christian… (See Jurgen Moltmann The Crucified God)

How can God, condemned, be hanging?
False messiahs meet such ends, 
and the ones then testifying, 
have no need to make amends.
Educated folk were laughing, 
they foresaw what was to come, 
saw disciples hiding, crying, 
feeling both distraught and numb.
             
But that early Easter morning 
brought another scene to bear, 
Jesus mission had not ended, 
he was risen, standing there.
Still the story, more than foolish 
soon gave rise to talk and doubt. 
‘Surely God could never suffer?’ 
taunting people tease and shout.
             
Signs and wisdom are confounded 
by that stumbling block, the cross. 
Things that we once saw as wisdom 
now dismissed as foolish dross.
God had shown such strength in weakness. 
Those who shared Christ’s dying breath
now at last could claim dominion, 
love defeating hate and death.

Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2012 © 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 D Tune: CALON LAN
Created by HymnQuest.com

Such blasphemous extravagance – a hymn inspired by the raising of Lazarus but pertinent at this time

John 11:1-45 – The raising of Lazarus - Jesus’ assertions that his actions would demonstrate who he was were, to those around him, blasphemous in the extreme…and all this in the context that he was moving nearer to Jerusalem where he would be crucified.

This lyrical poem seems pertinent in the world at this time…

1	Such blasphemous extravagance 
	as limb is torn from limb;
	expense is unaccountable, 
	is this the final sin? 

2	There is no god, yet pain is god,  
	and God is very real, 
	amid the carnage and the fear, 
	the hatred that we feel

3	And did God look through human eyes 
	and touch with human hands, 
	and did a human mind discern 
	love's seed sown in these lands?

4	Yes, Christ is God, incarnate God, 
	and still his flesh is torn; 
	and eyes that look on all the world 
	with tears and cares are worn.

5	And still God hangs with wondering eyes 
	and all the world seems lost, 
	and no one dares to face the facts, 
	while parents count the cost.

6	When will we learn, O can we learn, 
	the lesson that Christ taught: 
	that wood and nails can never end 
	the love for which he fought.

Andrew Pratt (born 1948)
© 2010 Stainer and 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: 8 6 8 6
Tune: BRISTOL Ravenscroft – ‘Hark the glad sound’

Created by HymnQuest.com

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

A hymn for Transfiguration – ‘So tired with the heat and the height of their climbing’

So tired with the heat and the height of their climbing, 
now resting where eagles might shelter their young, 
disciples had followed, but Jesus now left them, 
to wander yet higher, compelled he went on.

And now in a light that transfigured their vision, 
the one they called Master was standing alone,
and yet it appeared that some others stood with him, 
in whiteness, in brightness, the clouds like a throne.

The dazzle was blinding for those who were watching, 
but then it seemed Jesus was heading back down, 
the vision had faded, the moment was passing, 
Messiah they’d called him who shunned any crown;

until on a hilltop, mid rubbish and slander, 
this ‘king’ was hung out in the sun, set to dry;
crossed out between those others deemed rough and worthless, 
the poor and discarded for whom he would die.

To those who had hung him, he offered forgiveness, 
a crucified robber was paradise bound; 
the poor he exalted, the widow, the stranger, 
found love in this preacher who turns lives around.

Andrew E Pratt
Words © 2018 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