One day, I dream, our children will not hunger – inspired by Zacchaeus
One day, I dream, our children will not hunger:
when I have put aside my grasping greed,
when neighbours are true friends we love and cherish,
when hand in hand we meet each human need.
I long to greet that day when human crying
is heard no more upon this ravaged earth,
when children grow in hope and not in horror,
not fearful of food’s scarcity or dearth.
I scan the distance, glimpsing heaven’s embers,
an afterglow of all that might have been,
reminding of what still might be before us
if we can act with love within this scene.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2023 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
LORD OF THE YEARS
O PERFECT LOVE
Downloaded from HymnQuest.com
Tag: greed
Reflecting on the Good Samaritan – hymn – ‘All the power that fuelled creation’
Reflecting on the Good Samaritan – ‘All the power that fuelled creation’
1 All the power that fuelled creation,
cosmic force that fired the stars,
still leaves people in the darkness
when we grasp for 'us' and 'ours'.
All the emptiness and sorrow
we dispel with just a glance,
eyes averted from our neighbours
giving them no second chance.
2 All we cling to, all we cherish,
stands as nothing in God’s light,
yet our attitudes deny it
holding all as if by right.
All the wealth at our disposal
could bring hope, transfigure care;
even candles lit in darkness
bring new hope when none is there.
3 All we need is love and kindness,
costly kindness to dispel
fear and poverty, while bringing
deepest love to counter hell.
All God’s love, when shared among us
shatters poverty with grace,
even now transfiguration
could be felt within this place.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
© 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: 8 7 8 7 D
Tunes: SCARLET RIBBONS; ABBOTS LEIGH
For another text relating to the Good Samaritan click here
God, when hope of peace is sullied – for Ukraine
God, when hope of peace is sullied
God, when hope of peace is sullied,
sown with hatred, fed with lies,
threaded through with blind rhetoric,
strengthen us and hear our cries.
Give us language to remodel
human values lost in dust
sharing through our conversation
lives of loving, living trust.
Take away all greed and grasping,
soothe our sorrow, meet our need,
help us as we seek to nurture
every bruised, or broken, reed.
May we see in every nation
siblings of a common birth,
seeing Christ in one another
sharing heritage and worth.
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.
Tune: ALL FOR JESUS
Written following President Trump’s meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine, 28/2/2025.
A hymn inspired by 1 Samuel 8: 4 – 11, 16 – 20 for Second Sunday after Pentecost perhaps still pertinent? – The warning went unheeded…
A hymn inspired by 1 Samuel 8: 4 – 11, 16 – 20
for Second Sunday after Pentecost perhaps still pertinent?
1 The warning went unheeded,
that power corrupts and fires
a need for domination,
that wealth and fear conspires
to elevate the powerful,
to subjugate the poor,
that those who have most riches
will always look for more.
2 The people pleaded loudly,
'most nations have a king',
and reason would not change them
from wanting such a thing.
As history unfolded
they learnt, as if in youth,
that kings are only human,
a long-forgotten truth.
3 So Saul was soon anointed
and feted by his peers,
his reign was sometimes blighted,
brought hurt and pain and tears.
That lesson we're still learning:
that power blinds to need,
and wealth is hoarded, hidden,
and selfishness a creed.
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: AURELIA
Great God, your love has held our lives – Remembrance Hymn
1 Great God, your love has held our lives through all the years down to this day. Your constant presence held us fast: remain with us we plead and pray. We've seen the ruins left by war, the tumbled buildings, street by street; some heard the voices that they loved and cried for those they'd no more meet. 2 As time moves on some memories fade, some griefs we shared lie in the past; for others pain is just as sharp, we know their hurt will always last. Some human acts have swept away our partners, parents, children, friends, some people we had never known; the memory lives and never ends. 3 Beyond this day we try to live: a sinew of each life survives, but where is God in hurt and hate? The questions stay to haunt our lives. Help us to build a better world not fuelled by vengeance, fed by greed; a world in which we all can live, what ever colour, race or creed. 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: LMD Tune: JERUSALEM Other resources: Worshipcloud
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