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!!!
A challenge to the church to change – ‘When the church, afraid of changing’
Hymn writers sometimes ask questions of the church and then flesh out the consequences of the actions they have described. Fred Pratt Green’s - ‘When the Church of Jesus shuts its outer door’ is one such hymn (perhaps too challenging, or near to the bone, to be in Hymns & Psalms or Singing the Faith?) As we live out the time through lectionary readings from resurrection to Pentecost we have a chance to reflect on what the church is, and what it might be expected to be. Remember that Jesus death was partly a consequence of his challenging people to change their perspectives of faith.
When the church, afraid of changing, clings to glories of the past, holding fast to long lost memories, sure that it will always last, lost in time, devoid of spirit, know this truth, its fate is cast.
When the church no longer welcomes people other than it's own, when it thinks its understanding stands complete, is fully grown, love is rarely seen in action, grace is only, thinly, sown.
Jesus challenged expectation, turning tables upside down, those who once were thought as holy he confronted with a frown. When, then, will we learn the lesson, own that cross, that thorny crown?
A hymn reflecting on Hebrew scriptures – In the silent stillness
1 In the silent, stillness, listen, God is calling will we hear? All too often faith has foundered, grace is muzzled by our fear. In our rush and haste and hurry we have lost the time for prayer; lost the time for conversation, then we think God is not there.
2 Yet our forebears grasped a promise of a covenant of grace; God is faithful to that promise in this present time and place. Limitless in application, boundless in its scope and span; grace is wide enough for thousands, here there is no 'also ran'!
3 Spoken to a chosen people for the nations of the earth, see God's love is offered freely, recognising all have worth. More than milk, than wine or honey, God has offered, God will give bread that all may feast, and freely, all rejoice, that all may live!
Toward Pentecost – when a world calls out for healing - Christ's body has been broken
1 Christ's body has been broken, not bread but human lives, each family has scattered, just memory survives; the parents cry in anguish, the children cry in fear, we label them as migrant, not wanted over here.
2 These are our human neighbours, relations from our birth, each sister, child or brother, as one on this wide earth. If we claim God as parent, 'our Father' as we say, when will we own the the meaning of empty words we pray?
3 God, help us welcome others, God break the barriers down, that tears may turn to laughter, and smiles displace each frown; then may we live together, forgiven by your grace, the Pentecostal promise, one Godly human race!
Words by Jim Burklo (Use freely, with attribution) Tune: O Waly Waly (Welsh folk tune) — also known as The Water Is Wide (listen to James Taylor’s performance of it) Alternative tune:“Jerusalem” – an unofficial anthem of England
For deeper love we share the bread I won’t be full till all are fed Till every soul has home and bed The rest of us can’t move ahead
For deeper love we share the wine I cannot taste the love divine Till every soul has walked the line And you’ve had yours as I’ve had mine
Now Mary sings her birthing song Till every voice can sing along And voices weak will rise up strong Her choir is one where all belong
No one’s saved till all are healed As Jesus on the Mount revealed Your life and mine forever sealed Just like the lilies of the field
We follow where the Christ has led To table that for all is spread And no one’s sitting at the head But deeper love in wine and bread….
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