Storyteller's World

Songs of Praise at Elsfield this evening, and we closed down our evening service at Marston so that the folk from here could go and support their neighbours up the hill. Carolyn and Anthony (churchwardens) had given me a list of hymns that people had nominated, from which I chose 11, and added to them a 12th which was one of my own favourites: 'I, the Lord of sea and sky'. The little church was pretty full and we sang with gusto; most of them real old favourites, some of them things that some people had known from childhood, while others had never heard of them. Even in this 'homogeneous', old-fashioned congregation, there is a wide variety of people with different backgrounds (Anglican, Baptist, Methodist) to say nothing of having used different hymn books at school. Sometimes you feel the ecumenical movement has 'worked', for here we all are, worshipping God together and enjoying it. Nothing could be more theological than hymns, yet the fact that they are also poetry set to music makes them somehow more widely acceptable than any 'agreed statements' between the churches. Why can't we just all sing, instead of writing, or making formal definitions?

The acoustics at Elsfield are marvellous; I can't think why recording companies aren't beating a path to our door, demanding to pay us lots of money to use our building to make their recordings.

I chose the wrong tune to 'Lead, kindly light', and after we have limped and struggled through it, I let them sing the last verse again, this time to the 'right' tune. It's great to have a congregation who don't mind the vicar getting it wrong, or having to put him right; and it's great to have the informality to be able to do this. It's because we love one another; and it reminds me how truly blessed I am to be the pastor to these two wonderful groups of people. God, I love them!