Suggested Hymns from HymnSite.com
Sundays After PentecostProper 18[23]
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| Scripture | Theme | Hymns |
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| Proverbs
22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23 -or- Isaiah 35:4-7a |
Responsibility for the Poor, Justice for the Poor *** Wholeness Restored, God's New Day |
Featured Hymn
427 Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life 436 The Voice of God is Calling 434 Cuando El Pobre 432 Jesu, Jesu *** 305 Camina, Pueblo de Dios 384 Love Divine 57 O For a Thousand Tongues 567 Heralds of Christ Additional Suggestions |
| Psalm 125
-or- |
Security in God, Stability of God's People God's Faithfulness, Trust in God, God's Bias for the Oppressed |
60 I'll Praise My Maker While I've Breath 141 Children of the Heavenly Father 73 O Worship the King 140 Great is Thy Faithfulness Additional Suggestions |
| James 2:1-10, (11-13), 14-17 | Good Works, Solidarity with the Poor |
581 Lord, Whose Love Through Humble Service 587 Bless Thou the Gifts 593 Here I Am, Lord Additional Suggestions |
| Mark 7:24-37 | The Claim of "Outsiders", Social Roles Challenged |
579 Lord
God, Your Love has Called Us Here 549 Where Charity of Love Prevail 276 The First One Ever Additional Suggestions |
Featured Hymn
Where Cross the Crowded Ways
of Life
Text: Frank Mason North
Tune: GERMANY
For most modern readers of the text of this hymn by Dr. Frank Mason North, it is hard to imagine that he had in mind only the New York City of 1905. His portrayal of the human needs of urban dwellers is equally compelling today whether one is familiar with Tulsa, Oklahoma or Washington, D.C.; Albuquerque or Atlanta; Wichita or Dallas. And its vision of God's City as the alternative to urban realities is as needed today as it was at its beginning.
Dr. North, a New York Methodist Episcopal clergyman and respected leader of the forerunner of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, had a chance meeting in 1903 with a member of the 1905 Methodist Hymnal Commission. He was asked to write a mission hymn for the book. He thought first of the mission work with which he was most familiar -- New York City. Then while preparing a sermon on Matt. 22:9, he read a translation which expanded the familiar language of the KJV "highways" to "partings of the highways."
Intrigued by that image, Dr. North's sermon developed around some of the world's great centers at the convergence of city streets. This led particularly to the first line of the hymn. The 2nd verse reflects his first hand knowledge of the inner city -- squalid tenements, dumbell-shaped apartments where the only light and air for inner rooms is a narrow shaft into which tenants throw their rubbish, dark basement one-room apartments cluttered with all the family's possessions, the one hall toilet serving half a dozen families (the old and the little ones, of various races, languages and characters), shared by vagrants, drug dealers and users, innocent children and diseased prostitutes.
At the time of this hymn's writing middle class Americans had no concept of the way people in the major cities of our world lived. One has to ask if even late 20th century TV technology has portrayed it in all its degredations and miseries. North's hymn helps to keep this part of our culture in the Christian worldview.
But what about rural dwellers who sing this hymn? Would it not be appropriate to remind them that the ills of the inner city are creeping into the rural centers of the world as well? That classism and racism and greed are present even in their world?
The hymn first appeared in a 1903 organ of the New York City Mission Society, and then was included in the 1905 hymnal. It has appeared in every subsequent hymnal of the Methodist Church.
As you read the words of the hymn, think about where paths cross in your ways of life.
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1. Where cross the crowded ways of life, where sound the cries of race and clan, above the noise of selfish strife, we hear your voice, O Son of man. |
2. In haunts of wretchedness and need, on shadowed thresholds dark with fears, from paths where hide the lures of greed, we catch the vision of your tears. |
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3. From tender childhood's helplessness, from woman's grief, man's burdened toil, from famished souls, from sorrow's stress, your heart has never known recoil. |
4. The cup of water given for you still holds the freshness of your grace; yet long these multitudes to view the sweet compassion of your face. |
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5. O Master, from the mountainside make haste to heal these hearts of pain; among these restless throngs abide; O tread the city's streets again. |
6. Till all the world shall learn your love and follow where your feet have trod, till, glorious from your heaven above, shall come the city of our God! |
Lection at HymnSite.com
Contributed by Rev. Linda K. Morgan-Clark
Additional Suggestions for Proverbs, Psalm 146, Epistle and Gospel Lections
See also Index listings: "Social Concerns" p.952; also Hymns 425-450 (Social Holiness)
Links please
God bless you!
| Passages suggested are from The Revised Common Lectionary: Consultation on Common Texts (Abingdon Press, 1992) copyright © by the Consultation on Common Texts (CCT), P.O. Box 340003, Room 381, Nashville TN 37203-0003. Reprinted with permission of CCT. |