PROGRAM TEXTS: All Creation Sings
The Word Was God
Music: Rosephanye Powell
Text: John 1: 1-3
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by Him.
Nothing was made that He has not made.
God’s Grandeur
Music: Benedict Sheehan (b. 1980)
Text: Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)
The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
Reflections
Music: Jake Runestad (b. 1986)
Text: Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
We live but a fraction of our life.
We do not fill all our pores with our blood;
we do not inspire and expire fully and entirely enough,
so that the wave of each inspiration
shall break on our farthest shores,
rolling ’til it meets the sand which bounds us,
and the sound of the surf comes back [to us].
Why do we not let on the flood, raise the gates,
and set all our wheels in motion?
There is the calmness of the lake
when there is not a breath of wind;
so it is with us.
Sometimes we are clarified and calmed
as we never were before.
We become like a still lake of purest crystal
and without an effort
our depths are revealed to ourselves.
All the world goes by us
and is reflected in our deeps.
Such clarity!
Obtained by such pure means!
By simple living,
by honesty of purpose.
To be calm, to be serene!
Now Is the Cool of the Day
Music: Jean Ritchey (1922-2015), arr. Kevin Siegfried (b. 1969)
Text: Jean Ritchey
My Lord, he said unto me,
“Do you like my garden so fair?
You may live in this garden if you keep the grasses green,
and I’ll return in the cool of the day.”
Then my Lord, he said unto me,
“Do you like my garden so pure?
You may live in this garden if you keep the waters clean,
and I’ll return in the cool of the day.”
Now is the cool of the day,
now is the cool of the day,
O this earth is a garden, the garden of my Lord,
and he walks in his garden in the cool of the day.
Then my Lord, he said unto me,
“Do you like my garden so green?
You may live in this garden if you keep the people free,
and I’ll return in the cool of the day.”
Now is the cool of the day,
now is the cool of the day,
O this earth is a garden, the garden of my Lord,
and he walks in his garden in the cool of the day.
All That Could Never Be Said
Music: Christopher Tin
Text: Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
All that could never be said,
All that could never be done,
Wait for us at last
Somewhere back of the sun;
All the heart broke to forego
Shall be ours without pain,
We shall take them as lightly as girls
Pluck flowers after rain.
And when they are ours in the end
Perhaps after all
The skies will not open for us
Nor heaven be there at our call.
Hear My Prayer, O Lord
Music: Henry Purcell (1659-1695)
Text: Psalm 102:1
Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my crying come unto thee.
All Creatures Lament (Hymn for a Suffering Planet)
Music: Benedict Sheehan (b. 1980)
Text: Kate Bluett, Isaac Wardell, Paul Zach
All creatures of our God and King,
Lift up your voices, let them ring.
Fill the earth with lamentation!
Cry out abuses of our pow’r;
Tell what we lose with every hour
To our greed and depredation.
Lord, have mercy;
Christ, have mercy;
Lord, have mercy.
All creatures winging in the air,
Cry out the failures of our care.
Fill the sky with lamentation!
Shout through the clouds of smoke and ash,
Choked with the fumes of poison gas,
Tell us of our degradation.
Lord, have mercy;
Christ, have mercy;
Lord, have mercy.
All creatures hidden in the seas,
Lift up your anguished prayers and pleas.
Fill the sea with lamentation!
Teach us to see your wonders now.
Help us to make a holy vow
Here to halt your devastation.
Lord, have mercy;
Christ, have mercy;
Lord, have mercy.
All creatures dwelling in the land,
Join as we lift each heart and hand.
Fill the world with lamentation!
Mourn the destruction of our home;
Weep with the fear of worse to come.
Hear the groans of all creation:
Lord, have mercy;
Christ, have mercy;
Lord, have mercy.
Earth Song
Music & text: Frank Ticheli (b. 1958)
Sing, Be, Live, See…
This dark stormy hour,
The wind, it stirs.
The scorched earth
cries out in vain:
O war and power,
You blind and blur.
The torn heart
cries out in pain.
But music and singing
Have been my refuge,
And music and singing
Shall be my light.
A light of song
Shining strong: Alleluia!
Through darkness, pain, and strife, I’ll
Sing, Be, Live, See
The Peace of Wild Things
Music: Jake Runestad (b. 1986)
Text: Wendell Berry (b. 1934)
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
God, Who Stretched
Music: Alice Parker (b. 1925)
Text: Catherine Cameron (b. 1967)
God, who stretched the spangled heavens,
infinite in time and place,
flung the suns in burning radiance
through the silent fields of space,
we, your children, in your likeness,
share inventive powers with you.
Great Creator, still creating,
show us what we yet may do.
We have ventured worlds undreamed of
since the childhood of our race;
known the ecstasy of winging
through untraveled realms of space;
probed the secrets of the atom,
yielding unimagined power,
facing us with life’s destruction
or our most triumphant hour.
As each far horizon beckons,
may it challenge us anew,
children of creative purpose,
serving others, honoring you.
May our dreams prove rich with promise,
each endeavor well begun.
Great Creator, give us guidance
till our goals and yours are one.
For the Beauty of the Earth
Music: Philip Stopford (b. 1977)
Text: Folliott S. Pierpoint (1835-1917)
For the beauty of the earth,
for the glory of the skies,
for the love which from our birth
over and around us lies.
For the beauty of each hour
of the day and of the night,
hill and vale and tree and flower,
sun and moon and stars of light.
For the joy of human love,
brother, sister, parent, child,
friends on earth, and friends above;
Pleasures pure and undefiled.
For each perfect gift of Thine,
to our race so freely given;
graces human and divine,
Flowers of earth and buds of heaven.
For thy church which ever more
lifteth holy hands above,
offering up on every shore
her pure sacrifice of love:
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
this our sacrifice of praise.
Come to the Woods
Music: Jake Runestad (b. 1986)
Text: John Muir (1838-1914)
Another glorious day, the air as delicious
to the lungs as nectar to the tongue.
The day was full of sparkling sunshine,
and at the same time enlivened with one of
the most bracing wind storms.
The mountain winds bless the forests with love.
They touch every tree, not one is forgotten.
When the storm began to sound,
I pushed out into the woods to enjoy it.
I should climb one of the trees for a wider look.
The sounds of the storm were glorious with
wild exuberance of light and motion.
Bending and swirling backward and forward, round and round,
in this wild sea of pines.
The storm-tones died away, and turning toward the east,
I beheld the trees, hushed and tranquil.
The setting sun filled them with amber light, and seemed to say,
“Come to the woods, for here is rest.”
To You, O God, All Creatures Sing
Music: David Hendrix (b. 1986)
Text: St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1225), adapt. Miriam Therese Winter (b. 1938)
To you, O God, all creatures sing,
and all creation, everything
sings your praises, alleluia!
Your burning sun with golden beam,
your silver moon with softer gleam
sing your praises, alleluia!
Your wind that blows the tempest by,
your clouds that sail across the sky
sing your praises, alleluia!
Your morning rises with a song,
and lights of evening sing along,
sing your praises, alleluia!
Your flowing waters, crystal clear,
make melodies for you to hear,
sing your praises, alleluia!
Your fire, bountiful and bright,
remembering your warmth and light,
sings your praises, alleluia!
Now let all things their creator bless,
and worship God in humbleness,
O praise God! Alleluia!
Praise the Creator, praise the Son,
and praise the Spirit, three-in-one!
O praise God! Alleluia!
