CHRISTIAN LIFE >> LovING SERVICE
SDAH 581
When the church of Jesus shuts its outer door,
Lest the roar of traffic drown the voice of prayer:
May our prayers, Lord make up ten times more aware
That the world we banish is our Christian care.
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For Worship Leaders
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Introductions for Sabbath School Song Service (based on specific lesson quarterlies):
Fred Pratt Green (1903-; see Biographies) wrote this hymn for a stewardship renewal campaign while he was pastor of Trinity Methodist Church in the London borough of Sutton. The phrase “money, talents, time” reminds us that true Christian stewardship involves more than just giving money. Stanzas 1 a 1 and 2 are even more challenging in regard to our responsibility to the world around the church. May the hymns we sing behind the closed doors of the sanctuary never “drug us to forget its needs.” He wrote this at a time when the church was being criticized for its overconcern with its own life and its failure to be involved in the world’s activities. This hymn was actually the beginning of his most successful career as a hymnwriter, at the age of 65!
The noted British hymnologist John Wilson (see SDAH 397) encouraged Fred to change the third line of the third stanza, which originally read, “Let the world rebuke us by the way it gives,” to “Lord, reprove, inspire us by the Way You give.” Since the initial publication in Hymns and Songs, it has been widely used around the world in many denominational hymn books.
The words are an echo of the practical Christianity described in James 1:22, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only,” and 1 John 3:18, “Let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.”
The Episcopal Church of America was the first to wed this text to Ralph Vaughan Williams’ (1872-1958; see Biographies) folk song-like tune KING’S WESTON, which SDAH uses again at No. 232, “At the Name of Jesus.”
📖 Reference: Companion to the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal by Wayne Hooper and Edward E. White. Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1988.
Text
1
When the church of Jesus shuts its outer door,
Lest the roar of traffic drown the voice of prayer:
May our prayers, Lord make up ten times more aware
That the world we banish is our Christian care.
2
If our hearts are lifted where devotion soars
High above this hungry suffering world of ours:
Lest our hymns should drug us to forget its needs,
Forge our Christian worship into Christian deeds.
3
Lest the gifts we offer, money, talents, time,
Serve to salve our conscience to our secret shame:
Lord, reprove, inspire us by the way you give;
Teach us, dying Savior, how true Christians live.
Hymn Info
Biblical Reference
(b) Jas 2:17
Author
Fred Pratt Green (1903-2000)
Copyright
Words copyright 1969 by Hope Publishing Co., Carol STream, IL 60188. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Music from Enlarged Songs of Praise by permission of Oxford University Press.
Hymn Tune
KING’S WESTON
Metrical Number
6.5.6.5.D.
Composer
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958)
Unison Setting
SDAH 232
