Today's selection includes hymns to mark Anzac Day on 25 April, there's a hymn tune by Arthur Sullivan (the music half of Gilbert and Sullivan) and a setting of Immortal, Invisible that we should hear more often..
Poppy fields in Flanders Photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Poppies_Field_in_Flanders.jpg CC-BY-2.0 / Tijl Vercaemer
SONG: ALLELUIA! ALLELUIA! HEARTS TO HEAV’N
Artist: Wells Cathedral Choir
Words/Music: Wordsworth/Sullivan
Recording: Hyperion 112102
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Hearts to heaven and voices raise:
Sing to God a hymn of gladness,
Sing to God a hymn of praise:
He, who on the cross a victim,
For the world's salvation bled,
Jesus Christ, the King of glory,
Now is risen from the dead.
Christ is risen, Christ the first-fruits
Of the holy harvest-field,
Which will all its full abundance
At His second coming yield:
Then the golden ears of harvest
Will their heads before Him wave,
Ripened by His glorious sunshine
From the furrows of the grave.
Christ is risen, we are risen!
Shed upon us heavenly grace,
Rain and dew and gleams of glory
From the brightness of Thy face:
That we, with our hearts in heaven,
Here on earth may fruitful be,
And by angel-hands be gathered,
And be ever, Lord, with Thee.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Glory be to God on high;
Alleluia to the Saviour
Who has gained the victory;
Alleluia to the Spirit,
Fount of love and sanctity;
Alleluia! Alleluia!
To the Triune Majesty.
SONG: IMMORTAL, INVISIBLE, GOD ONLY WISE
Artist: Choirs of the Church of St Mary Magdalene, Toronto
Words/Music: Smith/Willan
Recording: Virgin VC 545109
Immortal, invisible, God only wise,
in light inaccessible hid from our eyes,
most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days,
almighty, victorious, thy great name we praise.
Unresting, unhasting, and silent as light,
nor wanting, nor wasting, thou rulest in might:
thy justice, like mountains high soaring above;
thy clouds, which are fountains of goodness and love.
To all, life thou givest, to both great and small.
In all life thou livest, the true life of all.
We blossom and flourish like leaves on the tree,
then wither and perish; but naught changeth thee.
Great Father of Glory, pure Father of Light,
Thine angels adore thee, all veiling their sight;
All laud we would render: O help us to see
‘Tis only the splendour of light hideth thee.
SONG: FAIREST LORD JESUS
Artist: Choir of Yorkminster Park Baptist Church, Catherine Palmer (dir), Ronald Jordan (organ)
Music: Anon/Trad
Recording: Marquis 181175
Fairest Lord Jesus, ruler of all nature,
O thou of God and man the Son,
thee will I cherish, thee will I honour,
thou, my soul's glory, joy and crown.
Fair are the meadows, fairer still the woodlands,
robed in the blooming garb of spring:
Jesus is fairer, Jesus is purer,
who makes the woeful heart to sing.
Fair is the sunshine, fairer still the moonlight,
and fair the twinkling, starry host;
Jesus shines brighter, Jesus shines purer,
than all the angels heaven can boast.
All fairest beauty, heavenly and earthly,
wondrously, Jesus, is found in thee;
none can be nearer, fairer or dearer,
than thou, my Saviour, art to me.
SONG: O GOD, OUR HELP IN AGES PAST
Artist: Choir of Sheffield Cathedral
Words/Music: Watts/Croft
Recording: Priory 713
O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home:
Under the shadow of thy throne
thy saints have dwelt secure;
sufficient is thine arm alone,
and our defense is sure.
Before the hills in order stood,
or earth received its frame,
from everlasting thou art God,
to endless years the same.
A thousand ages in thy sight
are like an evening gone,
short as the watch that ends the night
before the rising sun.
Time, like an ever rolling stream,
bears all our years away;
they fly forgotten, as a dream
dies at the opening day.
O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
be thou our guard while troubles last,
and our eternal home.
SONG: HONOUR THE DEAD
Artist: Viva Voce/John Rosser (dir), Michael Bell (org)
Words/Music: Murray/Gibson
Recording: NZ Hymnbook Trust 941300
Honour the dead, our country's fighting brave,
honour our children left in foreign grave,
where poppies blow and sorrow seeds her flowers,
honour the crosses marked forever ours.
Weep for the places ravaged by our blood,
weep for the young bones buried in the mud,
weep for the powers of violence and greed,
weep for the deals done in the name of need.
Honour the brave whose conscience was their call,
answered no bugle, went against the wall,
suffered in prisons of contempt and shame,
branded as cowards, in our country's name.
Weep for the waste of all that might have been,
weep for the cost that war has made obscene,
weep for the homes that ache with human pain,
weep that we ever sanction war again.
Honour the dream for which our nation bled,
held now in trust to justify the dead,
honour their vision on this solemn day:
peace known in freedom, peace the only way.
SONG: CHRIST IS OUR PEACE
Artist: St Peter’s Anglican Church, Takapuna
Words/Music: Murray/Trad
Recording: Radio NZ recording
Christ is our peace, Christ is our health,
he the true Word, his the true wealth
gifts to be shared by the simple and poor:
peace in your land, peace at your door.
Peace in your mouth, peace in the hands
open to truth, to love's demand;
those who would go with Christ also must bleed -
bright is the flower, burst is the seed.
Who work for peace find the true wealth,
who heal the hurt find their own helath
peace will flow on through the hearts that believe:
this may we know, thus may we live.
SONG: ETERNAL FATHER STRONG TO SAVE
Artist: Choir of the Royal Naval College Chapel, Greenwich
Words/Music: Whiting/Dykes
Recording: Abbey 280826
Eternal father, strong to save,
Whose arm doth bind the restless wave,
Who bids the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep;
Oh, hear us when we cry to thee,
For those in peril on the sea.
O Saviour, whose almighty word
The wind and waves submissive heard,
Who walkedst on the foaming deep,
And calm amid its rage did sleep:
O hear us when we cry to thee
For those in peril on the sea.
O Trinity of love and power,
Our brethren shield in danger's hour
From rock and tempest, fire and foe,
Protect them wheresoe'er they go:
And evermore shall rise to thee
Glad hymns of praise from land and sea.
SONG: LORD OF ALL HOPEFULNESS
Artist: Choir of St Clement’s Church, Philadelphia
Words/Music: Struther/Trad
Recording: Dorian 790259
Lord of all hopefulness, Lord of all joy,
Whose trust, ever childlike,
no cares could destroy,
Be there at our waking,
and give us, we pray,
Your bliss in our hearts, Lord,
At the break of the day.
Lord of all eagerness, Lord of all faith,
Whose strong hands were skilled
at the plane and the lathe,
Be there at our labours
and give us, we pray,
Your strength in our hearts, Lord,
At the noon of the day.
Lord of all kindliness, Lord of all grace,
Your hands swift to welcome,
Your arms to embrace.
Be there at our homing,
and give us, we pray,
Your love in our hearts, Lord,
At the eve of the day.
Lord of all gentleness, Lord of all calm,
Whose voice is contentment,
whose presence is balm,
Be there at our sleeping,
and give us, we pray,
Your peace in our hearts, Lord,
At the end of the day.
SONG: FILL THOU MY LIFE
Artist: Scottish Festival Singers
Composer: Bonar/Haweis
Label: EMI CMG
Fill thou my life, O Lord my God,
In ev'ry part with praise,
That my whole being may proclaim
Thy being and thy ways.
Not for the lip of praise alone,
Nor e'en the praising heart,
I ask, but for a life made up
Of praise in ev'ry part;
Praise in the common things of life,
Its goings out and in,
Praise in each duty and each deed,
However small and mean.
Fill ev'ry part of me with praise;
Let all my being speak
Of thee and of they love, O Lord,
Poor though I be, and weak.
So shalt thou, Lord, from me, e'en me,
Receive the glory due,
And so shall I begin on earth
The song for ever new.
So shall no part of day or night
From sacredness be free:
But all my life, in ev'ry step,
Be fellowship with thee.
