sharing – The Raynville Rambler

Today’s hymn from Sing Praise is another harvest themed one, “For the fruits of all creation” by Fred Pratt Green. It’s another one I have known for many years, and the original words, I’m sure were “For the fruits of his creation”. The change is presumably to avoid gendered pronouns for God, always a debatable point since doing so detracts from the idea that God is a personality and not a mere force.

The thanks we give, then, are firstly for the fruit of the earth itself, and for the human labour involved at all stages of food production (for without farmers and factory workers we would mostly be starving). In the second verse the emphasis shifts from food to “the help we give our neighbour”, with ‘neighbour’ being defined in a global sense. In caring and sharing with our global neighbours, “God’s will is done”. Most churches have for many years now celebrated harvest by asking for gifts of food or money for the relief of poverty at a local or international level, with the idea that all God’s blessings are intended to be shared and not used selfishly.

The third verse asks us to thank God for a wider range of blessings: the “harvests of the Spirit” (presumably what is usually called the “fruits of the Spirit”), the “good we all inherit” (not sure what that means!), and for the wonders of the world, for truth and the love of God himself.

John played this to the tune that I think is called ‘ar hyd y nos’, but I do like the one set here in the book by Francis Jackson, best known as the long-time organist of York Minster.

A chalice (shared cup) and paten (plate for the broken bread)

Today’s hymn from Sing Praise is “Behold the lamb who bears our sins away” by Keith Getty and Stuart Townsend. Unlike many of their hymns, this is a straightforward four-verse hymn with no chorus or bridge. The opening words are of course from the traditional communion prayer “Agnus Dei” (O Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us).

The repeated words common across the four verses are ‘remember’ and ‘share’. This is significant, because firstly in the communion we remember what Jesus has done for us: “we remember the promise made that all who come to faith find forgiveness at the cross … remember the wounds that heal, the death that brings us life … remember he drained death’s cup that all may enter in … remember our call to follow in the steps of Christ as his body here on earth”.

Secondly we share in the broken bread: communion by one person alone is not normally allowed (although in the Catholic church the priest can say mass alone on behalf of others in certain circumstances). The chorus of the first three verses is “So we share in this bread of life, and we drink of his sacrifice, as a sign of our bonds … around the table of the King”. But the ellipsis there represents differing phrases: the sharing is as a sign “of our bonds of peace”, “of our bonds of love”, “of our bonds of grace”. The fourth chorus is different, looking to Christ’s coming again.

The communion is a time to remember the past but also to acknowledge our shared life in Christ and to commit ourselves again to following him “until he comes again”.