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Then enjoy the wisdom of William Cowper, as found in two verses of his hymn What various hinderances we meet:

Have we no words? But think again;
words flow apace when we complain
and fill our fellow-creature’s ear
with the sad tale of all our care.

Were half the breath thus vainly spent
to heaven in supplication sent,
our cheerful song would oftener be,
‘Hear what the Lord has done for me!’

I have once had the fortune to take part in a carol service where While Shepherds Watched was sung to the tune of On Ilkla Moor baht 'at. It was a slight novelty: "Did you know that these words can be made to fit to this tune? What fun - let's do it!"

I recently received an e-mail asking about how you work out what the "meter" for a hymn is, and how you go about finding a tune that fits the words of a particular hymn.

In case my reply helps anybody else, here's what I said:

I've discovered a relatively new, and absolutely brilliant website for anyone involved in picking hymns for congregational use.

Visit http://www.hymnary.org

It is an online database containing an index of texts and tunes of all the hymns found in most of the major hymnals, developed by the same people behind Christian Classics Ethereal Library. Where MIDI files of tunes are available online, there is a link (so you can hear the tune). You'll get the hymn number in all the major hymnals too. You can search for tunes by name, composer or meter; you can search for hymn texts by title, by a full-text search, or by Scripture reference. Really, really useful stuff.

(It also happens to be a wonderful example of the CMS Drupal in action. There is no direct credit to Drupal on the site. I can tell that it's a Drupal site, but the fact is well-hidden by the good theming and the many custom features.)

The Church's one foundation
Is Jesus Christ, her Lord;
She is His new creation
By water and the word;
From heaven He came and sought her
To be His holy bride,
With His own blood He bought her,
And for her life He died.

Elect from every nation,
Yet one o’er all the earth,
Her charter of salvation—
One Lord, one faith, one birth;
One holy name she blesses,
Partakes one holy food,
And to one hope she presses
With every grace endued.

Though with a scornful wonder
Men see her sore oppressed,
By schisms rent asunder,
By heresies distressed,
Yet saints their watch are keeping,
Their cry goes up, ‘How long?’
And soon the night of weeping
Shall be the morn of song.

’Mid toil, and tribulation,
And tumult of her war,
She waits the consummation
Of peace forever more;
Till with the vision glorious
Her longing eyes are blessed,
And the great church victorious
Shall be the church at rest.

Yet she on earth hath union
With God the Three in One,
And mystic sweet communion
With those whose rest is won:
O happy ones and holy!
Lord, give us grace that we,
Like them, the meek and lowly,
On high may dwell with Thee.

Let the reader understand

Anyone wanting to learn how Anglican Chant works as a musical style for the Psalms could look at a couple of introductory webpages.

There is a helpful one on the BBC website at http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A15716595.

There is a helpful one on Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglican_chant, where I particularly like the example given - with a colour-coded musical stave that can be matched up to the text of part of the Magnificat printed in the same colours. Nice.

G'day everyone!

Many readers of this blog will already be familiar with the Aussie Christian children's entertainer / singer / song-writer Colin Buchanan. We possess 4 of his CDs in this house, and enjoy them regularly.

Well, Colin's heading over to Blighty to go on tour, so there is a rare opportunity to take the children in your family / church to go and hear him live. (And if you are an adult who wants to go, but doesn't have any children in your church or family, you must know someone to go with, surely - if not, I'd go anyway!)

We've been having a most enjoyable, instructive and edifying Lent Course here in Kemsing. John Goulding, a retired Anglican clergyman, has been taking the sessions, leading us through some of the Psalms. The feel of the evenings has been pleasantly relaxed, and as we've wandered together through the Psalter we've noticed all manner of things that has brought those Psalms to life in new ways. Many, many thanks to John for taking this course so well for us all.

I love discovering new hymns.

Like this one by Josiah Conder, entitled My Lord, I did not choose you.

God is working his purpose out,
As year succeeds to year;
God is working His purpose out,
And the time is drawing near;
Nearer and nearer draws the time,
The time that shall surely be,
When the earth shall be filled
With the glory of God,
As the waters cover the sea.