There's a focus on women hymn writer and translators in this week's programme, with hymns from Victorian-era writers Frances Ridley Havergal and Cecil Frances Alexander to some by our New Zealand hymn writers Marnie Barrell and Shirley Murray.
Tui singing, Wrights Hill, Wellington Photo: CC 3.0 / Tony Wills
SONG: MORNING HAS BROKEN
Artist: Choir of King’s College, Cambridge
Words/Music: Eleanor Farjeon/Trad
Recording: EMI 948306
Morning has broken, like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for them springing fresh from the word
Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall, on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness where his feet pass
Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the one light, Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise every morning
God's recreation of the new day.
SONG: HERE IN THE BUSY CITY
Artist: Viva Voce, John Rosser (dir), Michael Bell (organ)
Words/Music: Murray/Brinson
Recording: NZ Hymnbook Trust 9413000
Here in the busy city now let the Church be seen
Where lesser gods are worshipped in money and machine;
Where news is but sensation, the Good News hardly heard
Now let the Church take action in living out the Word!
In policies and planning the Church be there to speak
To moderate the powerful, to argue for the weak:
Where law must sit in judgment and love is little known,
There at the crisis centre the Christ concern be shown.
Where litter chokes the gutter and people go to waste,
Where joblessness is bitter and living lost its taste
To underleavened people the proof of rising yeast,
In lives devoid of flavour be saltiness released.
Here in the busy city God walks on every street
In generous or greedy, the honest or the cheat,
And daily we must offer the good that goes unpriced
With vigour and with vision the lifestyle of the Christ.
SONG: LIKE A RIVER GLORIOUS
Artist: Scottish Festival Singers
Words/Music: Havergal/Mountain
Recording: Whole World Media Group
Like a river glorious is God's perfect peace,
over all victorious in its bright increase:
perfect, yet it floweth fuller every day;
perfect, yet it groweth deeper all the way.
Refrain:
Stayed upon Jehovah
Hearts are fully blessed
Finding, as He promised,
Perfect peace and rest.
Hidden in the hollow of His blessed hand,
Never foe can follow, never traitor stand;
Not a surge of worry, not a shade of care,
Not a blast of hurry touch the spirit there.
Refrain:
Every joy or trial falleth from above,
Traced upon our dial by the Sun of Love;
We may trust Him fully all for us to do;
They who trust Him wholly find Him wholly true.
Refrain:
SONG: THERE IS A GREEN HILL FAR AWAY
Artist: Choir of Wells Cathedral, Malcolm Archer (dir), Rupert Gough (organ)
Words/Music: Cecil Frances Alexander/Horsley
Recording: Hyperion 112104
There is a green hill far away,
outside a city wall,
where the dear Lord was crucified
who died to save us all.
We may not know, we cannot tell,
what pains he had to bear,
but we believe it was for us
he hung and suffered there.
He died that we might be forgiven,
he died to make us good,
that we might go at last to heaven,
saved by his precious blood.
There was no other good enough
to pay the price of sin,
he only could unlock the gate
of heaven, and let us in.
Oh, dearly, dearly has he loved,
and we must love him too,
and trust in his redeeming blood,
and try his works to do.
SONG: THE REAL PRESENCE
Artist: Convivium Singers, Eamonn Dougan (dir), David Price (organ)
Words/Music: Margaret Rizza
Recording: Convivium Records 2013
[words unavailable]
SONG: CHRIST ASCENDS TO GOD
Artist: Viva Voce, John Rosser (dir), Michael Bell (organ)
Words/Music: Marnie Barrell/Barry Brinson
Recording: NZ Hymnbook Trust 941300
Christ ascends to God! Behold him
here, where earth and heaven meet.
Unimagined powers enfold him,
mortals worship at his feet.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
all his mission now complete.
God receives him into mystery -
clouds of glory veil the sight:
no more bound to human history,
strong as love and free as light.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
now to reign in his own right.
He is with us. Do not seek him
throned in splendour far above:
meet him here where truth and freedom
now reveal his work of love.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
countless signs his presence prove.
Universal Lord, now reigning
deep in nature’s smallest part’
all things live by your sustaining,
time and space your work of art.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
praise to Christ, creation’s heart.
SONG: BE STILL, MY SOUL
Artist: Choir of Trinity College, University of Melbourne
Words/Music: Katarina von Schlegel trans Jane Borthwick/Sibelius
Recording: ABC 476509
Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side.
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In every change, He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heav’nly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.
Be still, my soul: when dearest friends depart,
And all is darkened in the vale of tears,
Then shalt thou better know His love, His heart,
Who comes to soothe thy sorrow and thy fears.
Be still, my soul: thy Jesus can repay
From His own fullness all He takes away.
Be still, my soul: the hour is hast’ning on
When we shall be forever with the Lord.
When disappointment, grief, and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.
Be still, my soul: when change and tears are past
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.
SONG: NOW THANK WE ALL OUR GOD
Artist: Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, Stephen Cleobury (dir), Richard Farnes (organ)
Words/Music: trans Catherine Winkworth/Kruger
Recording: Argo 414609
Now thank we all our God
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom his world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us,
to keep us in his grace,
and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all ills
of this world in the next.
All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given,
the Son and Spirit blest,
who reign in highest heaven
the one eternal God,
whom heaven and earth adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.
Amen
