Once a prophet pictured Israel – A hymn inspired by Isaiah 5: 1-7 for the second Sunday in August


1 Once a prophet pictured Israel,
like a vineyard, overgrown,
no more fruitful, judged and broken,
left to ruin, overthrown.


2 In the tone hear disappointment
in the prophet’s call and cry,
seeing bloodshed wound his nation,
justice now a living lie.


3 Trampled waste land, good for nothing,
barren, fruitless, destitute,
is this now the way God sees us,
arid earth that feeds no root?


4 Or are we a fruitful people,
sown in faith to nurture grace,
bringing hope to all the nations,
love sustained in every place?


Andrew Pratt
Words © 2011 © 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
Tune: CROSS OF JESUS

Amos 7: 7-17 A pertinent passage… a pertinent hymn… a Prophet and a plumb-line

1	The prophet saw a plumb line simply hanging 
	to sign God's love amid the sons of men, 
	then, with the women, everyone is singing
	that God will never turn away again.
	
2	Yet Amos blew the whistle on God's people, 
	a prophet in a time of greed and need, 
	self-righteousness as high as any steeple, 
	spoke of abandonment of law and creed.
	
3	The powers that be would have him leave the country, 
	yet Amos stood as firm as any rock, 
	the words that he had spoken, quietly, humbly,  
	had power to break the proud, to shake and shock. 
	
4	The judgment was quite plain, for God had spoken, 
	a time for present challenge and for choice; 
	and as words echo through a world still broken, 
	we hesitate to praise or to rejoice.

Andrew Pratt, Words © 2015 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.
Metre: 11 10 11 10
Tune: INTERCESSOR




 


Used By Permission. CCL Licence No. 0000
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