For some reason

For some reason, after breakfast today, this old hymn popped into my brain. It is old, written by Synesius of Cyrene in about AD 430. The tune is Elizabethan, composed by William Daman (from The Psalmes of David in English metre). I love the tune. This version is an abbreviation of the whole poem, but it works well, I think.

Lord Jesus, think on me

Lord Jesus, think on me
And purge away my sin;
From earthborn passions set me free
And make me pure within.

Lord Jesus, think on me,
With many a care oppressed;
Let me Thy loving servant be
And taste Thy promised rest.

Lord Jesus, think on me
Amid the battle’s strife;
In all my pain and misery
Be Thou my Health and Life.

Lord Jesus, think on me
Nor let me go astray;
Through darkness and perplexity
Point Thou the heavenly way.

Lord Jesus, think on me
When floods the tempest high;
When on doth rush the enemy,
O Saviour, be Thou nigh!

Lord Jesus, think on me
That, when the flood is past,
I may th’eternal brightness see
And share Thy joy at last.

Lord Jesus, think on me
That I may sing above
To Father, Spirit, and to Thee
The strains of praise and love.
                 (translated from Greek by Allen W Chatfield in 1876)

We don't often sing worship songs which acknowledge the harshness and perplexity of human life. Perhaps we should sing more of them - with hope at the end. I hope you find it helpful.

Bo and Steve Stern

I have mentioned this couple before in my blogs. Bo has chronicled their experience of ALS/MND in her own blog. Yesterday's was especially moving for me, because I find it so easy to transpose Jane for Bo. My form of MND is not the same as Steve's, not so rapid, but the "muscle" in our marriage is very much Jane's. Here is Bo's blog post, called A Letter to 1985 revisited - in our case the date would be 1974. Do follow the link to Steve's part of the story.

I can’t begin to describe this past week, but my husband has done a good job telling part of the story here. I’ve never known a season more emotionally demanding. After a sleepless night, turning decisions and memories over in my mind a million times, I finally came to this one conclusion: Life is harder than I ever dreamed it would be, but as beautiful as I’ll let it be. So, on this the 14th day of March, 2014, I declare to you that Life. Is. Beautiful. Here’s a post I wrote awhile back. I believe in it more now than ever: —————————————————– Dear Very, Very Young Bo, You are about to walk down the aisle and marry the love of your life. You will say vows that are made of fancy words like protect, honor and “troth” (pretend you know what it means). You will promise to love Steve. He will promise to love you. You will promise to take care of him. He will promise to take care of you. In your heart, you will feel love beyond all sense of reason and you will be ready to sacrifice anything for him. Anything. Then the laundry will pile up. And he will want to go golfing when you want to have a long talk about a subject that is only interesting to you. And that’s when you’ll start to build some bargains into your relationship and they will sound almost vow-like in their virtue. You will tell him he can go golfing on Saturday if he will also clean the garage on Friday. You’ll agree to fold his underwear if he agrees to wash your car. You’ll make deals and he’ll make deals and before you know it, you’ll be living in a world that is fair-and-square and even-steven. You’ll learn to expect all the emotional ledgers to be balanced with exactly the right ratios of give-and-take. But eventually, your fear will get the best of you and you’ll have no courage to bring into…anything. Steve will find that all the chips have been moved to his side of the table as he works triple time to assure you that you are loved and safe. It will make him weary, but don’t even worry, he’ll handle it like the champ you only suspect he is now. He’ll love you fiercely and fight for your freedom and you will never feel for a moment that he regrets choosing you. Never for a moment. His love will help you find what you need to become brave like you’ve never imagined you could be. And that newfound courage? Hold onto it with both hands. Because, sister, the future you see as you peer through your wedding veil is going to take a turn you cannot possibly see coming. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. The day will come when you will be all the muscle in this marriage and you should stop laughing now, because I’m not actually kidding (but the comedy of the situation is not lost on me.) A dark day will come when you will steady his shaking hand as you sit in a hospital waiting room. You will button his shirt and help him shave. You will do the driving and the lifting and the working…but he will still be brave enough for both of you. Not gonna lie: some moments you’ll feel like you’ll buckle beneath the weight, but you won’t and neither will he. Because it turns out the vows aren’t perfect and they aren’t even-steven, but they are strong and real. They’re as strong as you’re willing to live them and as strong as the God who heard you say them. One day you’ll see a young, healthy couple make their promises, dressed in white. You will think about how they have all their days ahead of them and your heart will do a little squeeze because you remember that very moment in your life when the future stretched out so wide. But here’s the thing: you won’t envy them. Because you’ll know what you have is proven and true. It’s made of long nights and hard fights and a lot of giving when it seemed there was nothing more to give. In a world that is more comfortable with quitting than sticking, you will discover that the truest joy is not found in the shallows, but out in the deep. So, go say your vows. Eat the cake. Love your life. You will never regret this choice. But you might regret that dress. With courage, Much Older Bo

 "Many waters cannot quench love,
    neither can floods drown it.
If a man offered for love
    all the wealth of his house,    
he would be utterly despised" (Song of Solomon 8.7)

“I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”

It's clearly been a month since I posted on this blog because yesterday morning we were back in St Andrew's Church, Cullompton. Once again we were down visiting Jane's parents. We have developed a routine which means we drive down to Sidmouth on Saturday morning, spend the afternoon with the in-laws after I have ascended their Everest of a path and stay the night at the very convenient and comfortable Park and Lodge at Westcott.

Somehow we usually manage to arrive in Cullompton when they have "all-age" worship. This time it was a beautiful day. It had brought the tortoisehell butterflies out of hibernation in the church, around the windows and under the barrel roof. When Jane had manoeuvred me down the ramp, we were both given a pebble.... It became clear why soon. Jo, the children's worker, explained that members of the school's Kidzone Club of whom there were a lot present would be involved. And they were! She was telling the story of the two houses built on rock and on sand. When the rain came down, the water pistols came out and we got wet! And the house on sand went CRASH! The pebbles of course were symbols of the rock, and we'd written our names on them. They were also linked to Jesus renaming Simon as Peter the rock.

When it came to the prayers we were told to look under the pews where there were small containers of bubbles. "Now quietly think of someone about whom you're concerned or a worrying situation you're in. Then as a symbol of releasing those worries to God, blow those bubbles into the air." What a good action prayer! Since I can't blow bubbles anymore, I held the stone in my hand as I committed friends to the One who is the Rock. Somehow, for me at least, it was a more engaging form of prayer than the usual intercessions led from the front.

There is much more that I could comment on. They obviously have a talented writer of original worship songs - including action ones for children. I always like churches writing their own songs and singing new songs to the Lord, as the psalmist urged. And of course they sung one of my current favourites, My hope is built on nothing less (Cornerstone). I have been reflecting on why an old grouch like me should actually be so touched and helped by a service packed with all ages, but particularly children. I mean it all makes for a fair amount of chaos and "toing and froing", not exactly the passive reverence of much worship. Yet perhaps that is the point. It is very much worship. It is clearly surrounded by prayer. It's carefully prepared (160 pots of bubbles for a starter!). And it all focuses on God - and I suspect the presence of the children is a means of grace. "Unless you become like children, you will never enter the Kingdom of heaven": I have a feeling that in such services we are privileged to follow the kids into that Kingdom and receive from the King.

Thank you again, Cullompton!