If God is love, then God in love unites us If God is love, then God in love unites us, the essence of our being, sense and life, how can we be divided, for our nature is rooted in this Spirit, transcends strife. The ethic by which all our life is driven is grounded in relationship and prayer, for where love joins us, weaving bonds of friendship, be sure to find that God, through grace, is dwelling there. If this is so, then what can separate us: our human ego, hubris or our pride? For when we argue, struggle with each other, like children we are fighting for our side. Without God holding us we’re hollow cymbals, we need to let Love guide our ebb and flow, till entering the stream of love together, the harmony of hope through trust will surely show. Andrew Pratt 15/1/2023 written for Northwich & District Churches Together, with thanks to Robert Bridge for inspiration. Words © 2023 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: LONDONDERRY AIR
Tag: prayer
Broken buildings, flooded rivers – a hymn for Pakistan amid the floods
1 Broken buildings, flooded rivers
foaming like a liquid hell;
jagged rocks and raging waters,
currents twisting break the swell
into such a tortured maelstrom;
people reach and lives are saved;
human beings loved and treasured
where the waters heaved and raved.
2 Devastation, ruined farmland,
crops destroyed compound the threat,
images assail our conscience,
sights we never will forget;
here where homes had offered comfort
degradation meets our eyes,
while the thunder of the waters
drowns the sound of human cries.
3 God, we cry, as lives are wasted,
hold us when all else is lost;
where the floods have brought destruction
hold us, help us share this cost.
Lift us out of dereliction,
help us reach to those in need,
love them till all fear has foundered,
till they know they’re safe and freed.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Metre: 8 7 8 7 D
Tune: HYFRYDOL
Words © 2022 © 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., adapted from ‘Swirling winds and raging oceans’ © 2017 Stainer and Bell Ltd.
Great God we need your present grace – a hymn at the time of the resignation of Boris Johnson
Great God we need your present grace,
for honesty’s been shaken.
We need integrity and truth,
enliven and awaken
a seam of trust, a sense of faith,
while life is so uncertain,
the future hidden from our sight,
opaque behind a curtain.
God give a calm and steady hand,
unshackled by ambition,
to challenge hatred and distrust,
yet not employ derision.
Give us the time to act and learn,
to unify this nation,
a place where all might live as one
in spite of rank or station.
Is it too much for us to build
in gracious love and living,
a place to care, not built on greed,
but generous in giving,
where children grow in peace with hope,
as sister and as brother,
that, hand in hand, within this world
we’ll live with one another.
Metre: 8787D iambic
Tune: CONSTANCE (Sullivan)
Andrew Pratt 7/7/2022 – Responding to the resignation of Boris Johnson as leader of the Conservative Party
Words © 2022 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.
A number of my hymns selected by Pam Rhodes reflecting on Ukraine and included in Hearts & Hymns, Premier Radio including ‘We hear the news in anguish’
Each of these links will open an audio file from the programme first aired on 13th March 2022 –
All of Andrew Pratt’s hymns are copyright Stainer & Bell Ltd and texts can be found on HymnQuest
Pam Rhodes – Hearts & Hymns, Premier Christian Radio, 13/20 March 2022 – Ukraine, suffering, war and peace
Reflections for Ukraine based on some of my texts on Premier Christian Radio were broadcast (Freeview channel 725) on Sunday 13th March 2022 0800 hours (UK) A video prepared for SUNDAY NIGHT LIVE is available here with thanks to Pam Rhodes and Gareth Moore (to be broadcast Sunday 20th March 2022 at 1800 hours UK) Also see hymn @ https://hymnsandbooksblog.uk/2022/03/01/we-hear-the-news-in-anguish-hymn-at-time-of-russian-invasion-of-ukraine/
hymnsandbooks 