Poems and readings to reflect on and shape your faith
How to use Faith Shapers:
- Click on ROOMS to pick a theme
- Search for an author/poet by name
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USE FAITH SHAPERS FOR:
- Prayer or in time of personal need
- Resource for a group meeting
- Illustrations for a devotional address
- Material for a church study course
Latest Posts
Faith-shaping Poets
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Our Father: Hallowed on Earth as in Heaven
What I can say to you, my God?
Shall I collect together all the words that praise your holy name? Shall I give you all the names of this world, you, the unnameable? Shall I call you, “God of my life, meaning of my existence, hallowing of my acts, my journey’s end, bitterness of my bitter hours,...
Love is not far to go
It is not far to go For you are near, It is not far to go For you are here. And not by travelling, Lord, We come to you, But by the way of love, And we love you. Amy Wilson Carmichael (1867-1951), Edges of His Ways, 1980.
Earth’s crammed with heaven
And every common bush aflame with God But only he who sees takes off his shoes, The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries. Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-61), Aurora Leigh.
Recovered Greenness
How fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean Are thy returns! ev’n as the flowers of spring; To which, beside their own demean, The late-past frosts tributes of pleasure bring. Grief melts away Like snow in May, As if there were no such thing. Who would have thought my...
The Bible: Bestowed Word of God
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Jesus Christ: Crucified God in Person
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A new small-rented lease please
Having been tenant long to a rich Lord, Not thriving, I resolved to be bold, And make a suit unto him, to afford A new small-rented lease, and cancel the old. In heaven at his manor I him sought: They told me there, that he was lately gone About some land, which he...
Humankind: Sinful, Rebellious and Faithless
Me First!
I came out alone on my way to my tryst. But who is this that follows me in the silent dark? I move aside to avoid his presence but I escape him not. He makes the dust rise from the earth with his swagger; He adds his loud voice to every word that I utter. He is my own...
They wanted swine
And Christ went sadly. He had wrought for them a sign Of Love, and Hope, and Tenderness divine; They wanted - swine. Christ stands without your door and gently knocks; But if your gold, or swine, the entrance blocks, He forces no man's hold - he will depart, And leave...
I am
Here in this transport I, Eve, With my son, Abel. If you see my elder son, Cain, Son of Adam; Tell him that I am. (Scribbled in pencil in a sealed wagon used for transporting Jews).
My move
… The saint knows That the spiritual path Is a sublime chess game with God And that the Beloved Has just made … a Fantastic Move…. Whereas, my dear, I am afraid you still think You have a thousand serious moves. Hafiz...
The Grace of God: Justifying and Converting
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Judas: the first to be forgiven
In Hell there grew a Judas Tree Where Judas hanged and died Because he could not bear to see His master crucified Our Lord descended into Hell And found his Judas there For ever hanging on the tree Grown from his own despair So Jesus cut his Judas down And took him in...
Christ-likeness: Progressive Christian Living
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Wash my Feet
Swift, tired, true, headstrong, tender, merciless – your feet have more persona than your head: born for earth that you may be freed for sky – Does anything that serves you serve like this? So why should someone say, ‘Not my feet, Lord – far rather wash my hands or...
Holy Spirit: in Christian Experience
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Mysteries yes: look with astonishment
Truly we live with mysteries too marvellous to be understood…. Let me keep my distance, always, from those who think they have the answers. Let me keep company always with those who say ‘Look!’ and laugh in astonishment,...
Believers: Assured, Called and Prayerful
Resentful friend
Hello it is me, Your old friend and your old enemy, Your loving friend who often neglects you, Your complicated friend, Your utterly perplexed and decidedly resentful friend, Partly loving, partly hating, partly not caring. It is me. Harry Williams...
God stopped stars in flight and listened
He placed a prayer-wheel where the wild winds dance, And some complained his piety was lazy; But then his thoughts on prayer were rather lazy; Yet God attended to his suppliance. He knelt on scarlet plush before his Lord’ And mumbled words of ancient litanies, But...
Prayer: Watching and Waiting
Prayer is like watching for the Kingfisher. All you can do is Be where he is likely to appear, and Wait. Often nothing happens; There is space, silence and Expectancy. No visible sign, only the Knowledge that he’s been there, And may come again. Seeing or not seeing...
Silent Disapproval
The relation between us was silence; that and the feeling of each one being watched by the other... It had begun by my talking all of the time repeating the worn formulae of the churches in the belief that was prayer. Why does silence suggest disapproval? The...
The Church: Provisional but Necessary
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Time for Christianity to vanish?
On the whole Christianity I suppose is kinder than it was, Helped to it, I fear, by the power of the civil arm. Oh Christianity, Christianity, That has grown kinder now, as in the political world The colonial system grows kinder before it vanishes, are you...
The Mission of God
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Pull up the ladder Jack!
Deal not with me God as I have dealt with Man In the prosperity which thou hast given me Helpless in his need a careless course I ran And now O Lord that thou hast driven me To my last gasp, I pray for all I am not worth Deal not with me as I have dealt on earth....
Moral Justice: a Vision of God’s Kingdom
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Wasting the earth
O shame to men! Devil with Devil damned Firm concord holds; men only disagree Of creatures rational, though under hope Of heavenly grace, and, God proclaiming peace, Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strife Among themselves, and levy cruel wars, Wasting the earth, each...
Glory: Now and Then, Here and There
Our love hath no decay
The sun itself, which makes times, as they pass Is elder by a year now than then it was, When thou and I first one another saw; All other things to their destruction draw, Only our love hath no decay; This, no tomorrow hath, nor yesterday. Running, it never runs from...
Asleep in my Hand
Here in a quiet and dusty room they lie, Faded as crumbled stone or shifting sand, Forlorn as ashes, shrivelled, scentless, dry – Meadows and gardens running through my hand. Dead that shall quicken at the call of Spring, Sleepers to stir beneath June's magic kiss,...
God inhabits Creation
For as God is infinitely the greatest Being, so he is allowed to be infinitely the most beautiful and excellent: and all the beauty to be found throughout the whole creation is but the diffused beams of that Being who hath infinite fulness of brightness and glory....
Time: wrack of mortal things
Man at the best a creature frail and vain, In knowledge ignorant, in strength but weak, Subject to sorrows, losses, sickness, pain, Each storm his state, his mind, his body break, From some of these he never finds cessation, But day or night, within, without,...