Poems and readings to reflect on and shape your faith
How to use Faith Shapers:
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USE FAITH SHAPERS FOR:
- Prayer or in time of personal need
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- Illustrations for a devotional address
- Material for a church study course
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Faith-shaping Poets
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Our Father: Hallowed on Earth as in Heaven
Elected
Though the mariner sees not the polestar, yet the needle of the compass which points to it tells him which way he sails: thus the heart that is touched with the loadstone of divine love, trembling with godly fear, and yet still looking towards God by fixed believing,...
Father’s Day
Then, kneeling down to Heaven's Eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays: Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing," that thus they all shall meet in future days; there, ever bask in uncreated rays, no more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear; together...
War knows no Power?
Dear! Of all happy in the hour, most blest He who has found our hid security, Assured in the dark tides of the world that rest, And heard our word, ‘Who is so safe as we?’ We have found safety with all things undying, The winds, and morning, tears of men and...
God’s a Phone, Maybe
...say God's a phone, maybe. You know you didn't order a phone, but there it is. It rings. You don't know who it could be. You don't want to talk, so you pull out the plug. It rings. You smash it with a hammer till it bleeds springs and coils and clobbery metal bits....
The Bible: Bestowed Word of God
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Revelation before religion
Thus man by his own strength to heaven would soar: And would not be obliged to God for more. Vain, wretched creature, how art thou misled To think thy wit these God-lie notions bred! These truths are not the product of thy mind, But dropped from heaven, and of a...
Jesus Christ: Crucified God in Person
Be my Way, my Truth, my Life
Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life: Such a Way, as gives us breath: Such a truth, as ends all strife: Such a Life as killeth death. Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength: Such a Light, as shows a feast: Such a Feast, as mends in length: Such a Strength, as makes his...
I was fed up with God
I was fed up with God. He wasn’t there Or had forgotten me, or did not care, Left me alone To struggle hopelessly ‘gainst odds too great for me – my heart was stone. And young people talked about him far too much, Young people, who were strong, and should be gay....
Christ is the language in which we speak to God
Christ is the language in which we speak to God And also God, so that we speak in truth; He in us, we in him, speaking To one another, to him, the City of God. H. Sisson (1914-2003), The Usk, 1973.
Let me go there too
And God held in his hand a small globe. Look, he said. The son looked. Far off, as through water, he saw a scorched land of fierce colour. The light burned there; crusted buildings cast their shadows: a bright serpent, a river uncoiled itself, radiant with slime. On...
Humankind: Sinful, Rebellious and Faithless
Not just ordinary
There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations – these are mortal, as their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit – Immortal horrors or...
Liz Truss ‘Growth, Growth, Growth’
We have grown brave we modern folk, eager to kiss the moon’s reluctant face, defying every harness, chain and yoke, kicking our rockets down the field of space. We flout established customs undismayed, leap time and space with buttons we have pressed, attempt to...
Never Wonder
When she was half-a-dozen years younger, Louisa had been overheard to begin a conversation with her brother one day by saying, ’Tom, I wonder’ – upon which Mr Gradgrind, who was the person overhearing, stepped forth into the light and said, ‘Louisa, never...
Man was made to mourn
A few seem favourites of fate, In pleasure’s lap carest; Yet think not all the rich and great Are likewise truly blest: But oh! What crowds in every land, All wretched and forlorn, Thro’ weary life this lesson learn, That man was made to mourn. Many and...
The Grace of God: Justifying and Converting
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Love took my hand
Love bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back, Guilty of dust and sin. But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack From my first entrance in, Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning, If I lacked anything. ‘A guest’, I answered, ‘worthy to be here.’ Love said, ‘You...
Christ-likeness: Progressive Christian Living
Unanswered prayer
Mute, with signs I speak: Blind, by groping seek: Heed; yet nothing hear: Feel; find no one near. Deaf, eclipsed, and dumb, Through this gloom I come On the time-path trod Toward ungranted God. Carnal, I can claim Only his known name Dying, can but be...
Pilgrimage to Bardsey Island
There is an island there is no going to but in a small boat the way the saints went, travelling the gallery of the frightened faces of the long drowned, munching the gravel of its beaches. So I have gone up the salt lane to the building with the stone altar and the...
Get a glory
Oh you gotta get a glory! In the work you do, A Hallelujah chorus In the heart of you. Paint or tell a story, Sing or shovel coal, But you gotta get a glory Or the...
Contemplation’s door to wisdom and virtue
Virtue could see to do what virtue would By her own radiant light, though sun and moon Were in the flat sea sunk. And wisdom’s self Oft seeks to sweet retired solitude, Where with her best nurse Contemplation, She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings That in...
Holy Spirit: in Christian Experience
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Beauty beyond reason
… here you stand, adore and worship, when you know it not, pious beyond the intention of your thought, devout above the meaning of your will. Yes, you have felt, and may not cease to feel, The estate of man would be indeed forlorn If false conclusions of the reasoning...
Believers: Assured, Called and Prayerful
Longing to believe
While faith is with me, I am blest; It turns my darkest night to day; But, while I clasp it to my breast, I often feel it slide away. What shall I do if all my love, My hopes, my toil, are cast away? And if there be no God above To hear and bless me when I...
A Falling Leaf
… My life is in the falling leaf: O Jesus, quicken me. My life is like a faded Leaf’ My harvest dwindled to a husk; Truly my life is void and brief And tedious in the barren dusk; My life is like a frozen thing, No bud or greenness can I see: Yet rise it shall – the...
My bottom dollar
Two mites, two drops (yet all her house and land) Falls from a steady heart, though trembling hand. The others’ wanton wealth foams high and brave. The others cast away, she only gave. Richard Crashaw (1613-49), The Widow’s Mite.
You Yourself In Me
Lord, grant me to greet the coming day in peace. Help me in all things to rely upon your holy will. In every hour of the day, reveal your will to me. Bless my dealings with all who surround me. Teach me to treat all that comes to me throughout the day with peace of...
The Church: Provisional but Necessary
Prayer in forgotten places
For the blood of thy martyrs and saints Shall enrich the earth, shall create holy places. For wherever a saint has dwelt, wherever a martyr has given his blood for the blood of Christ, There is holy ground, and the sanctity shall not depart from it Though armies...
All Shall Be Well*
We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time. Through the unknown…. But heard, half-heard, in the stillness Between two waves of the sea…. And all shall be well and...
Praying in a deserted church
In this great absence that is like a presence, that compels me to address it without hope of a reply. It is a room I enter from which someone has just gone, the vestibule for the arrival of one who has not yet come. R.S. Thomas...
How to go to church
When once thy foot enters the church, be bare. God is more there, than thou: for thou art there Only his permission.... Resort to sermons, but prayers the most: Praying's the end of preaching.... In time of service seal up both thine eyes, And send them to...
The Mission of God
The poet’s prophetic task
The figure a poem makes; No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader. Robert Frost (1874-1963), 1939.
The poet’s true task
Therefore he no more troubled the pool of silence. The figure a poem makes But put on mask and cloak, Strung a guitar And moved among the folk. Dancing they cried, ‘Ah, how our sober islands Are gay again, since this blind lyrical tramp Invaded the Fair!’ Under...
Christ in the weakness of his power
Grandfather sits and begins breakfast, Staring into is coffee cup…. He is a Calvinist to be sure, sound and wise if settled in his ways. He believes in hell, and firmly in damnation, but will not call it down. He sees himself growing out of this world: trying...
Let all the world sing
Let all the world in every corner sing, My God and King ! The church with psalms must shout, No door can keep them out ; But above all the heart Must bear the longest part. Let all the world in every corner sing, My God and King ! George Herbert...
Moral Justice: a Vision of God’s Kingdom
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Escaping a recession
I am spending my way out Of a recession. The road chokes On delivery vans. I used to be Just looking Around, I used to be How Much, and Have You Got it in Beige. Now I devour whole stores – High speed spin; giant size; chunky gold; De luxe springing....
Glory: Now and Then, Here and There
Old age: make it bright
Gotten past the day I will give thanks, O Lord. The evening draweth nigh: Make it bright. There is an evening, as of the Day, so also life; The evening of life is old age: Old age hath overtaken Me: make it bright. Abide with me, O Lord, For even now it is towards...
Our Last Awakening
Bring us, O Lord our God, At our last awakening Into the house and gate of heaven, to enter into that gate and dwell in that house, Where there shall be no darkness or dazzling, But one equal light: No noise or silence, but one equal music: No fears or hopes, But one...
Face to face
I pray you, merciful Jesus, that as you have graciously granted me joyfully to imbibe the words of your knowledge, so you will also, of your goodness, grant that I may come at length to you, the fount of all wisdom, and stand before your face for ever. ...
Born among the trees and leaves
O who will show me those delights on high Echo. I Thou echo, thou art mortal, all men know. Echo. No Wert thou not born among the trees and leaves? Echo. Leaves. And are there any leaves that still abide? Echo. Bide. What leaves are they? Impart the matter wholly....