hymnsandbooks

Saturday, 13 April 2019

Monday, 5 November 2018

New hymnsandbooks site

NEW hymnsandbooks site at https://hymnsandbooks.blog

Wednesday, 17 October 2018

Creed or Love?

Mystery and wonder, 
love and compassion have freedom 
when we recognise that 
no ‘religious’ creed can ever be 
fixed or final. 
Then love can encompass those we have, 
in our wisdom, 
deemed to be beyond love 
even if our scripture and tradition 
seem to tell us otherwise.

Monday, 10 September 2018

When will we see all people just as people - Methodist Conference Marriage and Relationships - hymn/poem


When will we see all people just as people 
devoid of labels, prejudice and fear?
When can we love our neighbours without limit,
not loving just the ones to whom we’re near?

When can we share the grace of God more simply,
not clouded by theology or fudge,
in order that the world may sense the presence
of Christ in love, and not some frowning judge?

God give to us audacity and courage
to grasp each nettle, risking others’ sting,
until the love that binds us all together
will hold us in one vast unbroken ring.
Andrew Pratt
Words © 2018 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, 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.
Written in response to the Methodist Conference Marriage and Relationships Report having been delayed, as we were informed at Synod due to ‘unforeseen circmstances’.


Wednesday, 8 August 2018

Amien 2018

Words bear the smear of blood and dirt,
amid the broken bodies, fear and hurt;
and, as the witnesses record what they have seen,
do they forever think what might have been?
Copyright AndrewPratt 8/8/2018

Friday, 22 June 2018

Coexistence on earth


This world is tangled, lost in devastation,
people are struggling, longing to be free.
How long O Lord, must hurt and degradation
mar all that human eyes can search or see?

How long before all nations work together,
to save this planet lent to us in trust?
How long until we learn to plan and nurture,
before this land decays and turns to dust?

Give us, O God, in faith, cooperation,
that hand in hand we have the sense to share
riches that you have planted from creation,
that none go hungry, for their neighbours care.

This is our prayer that people once divided
may learn the value of another’s worth,
that those we once despised, or have derided,
may coexist on this once ravaged earth.

Andrew Pratt 18/6/2018 revised 25/6/2018
Words © 2018 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, 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:LORD OF THE YEARS
A hymn for human coexistence on earth 

Migrants in a hostile world

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.

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 a parent,
‘our Father’ as we say,
when will we own the meaning
of empty words we pray?

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!
Andrew Pratt 22/6/2018
Tune: AURELIA
Words © 2018 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, 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.
For Christians living in a broken world, in a hostile environment.