Come follow me – inspired by Mark 10:17-31
1 'Come follow me, come follow fast,
and leave the rest behind,
reach after realms of mystery,
yes, seek, and you will find'.
What holds us in this human realm?
What treasures keep us back
from giving all we have and are?
This confidence we lack!
2 The call had seemed impossible,
the problem was his wealth.
And we deflect the word of God
avoiding it by stealth.
Our legs are heavy, steps are slow,
it seems we cannot move.
The call to trusting seems absurd,
in things we cannot prove.
3 And so we stay with what is sure,
we cling to what is known,
and through our fear we lose our grip
on treasure we might own.
Then like that man we walk away,
each with a heavy heart,
or turn to follow in the way,
to make a brand new start.
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: DCM
Tune: KINGSFOLD
Tag: new start
Mouldy old log at the turning of the year…
Mouldy old log at the turning of the year,
once green,
now dead,
lacking sap.
Sad year passing,
gone,
dead.

Watch the turning,
burning of the season,
till white ash snow,
melting brings life,
again.

Not immortality
for that mouldy old log at the turning of the year
is dead,
but new life springs fresh
forcing through cracked,
raw, hardened earth,
starting again,

and that is what we, also,
should do…on and on…season after season…starting anew.
© Andrew Pratt 31/12/2019
Poem from Words, Images and Imagination https://hymnsandbooks.blog/words-images-and-imagination-now-published/
