Listening to you rant and rave has cheered me up immensly. I think changing Churches might be a wise idea1 Or re-writing song words!

A pet hate of mine is "Father God I Wonder". Maybe its irrational but the line "I can never be alone" always suggests that God is an annoying little brother that follows you around, listening outside the door, sneaking a peek at your diary etc.

I could moan for hours, maybe I'll be back after Church (and "If I were a butterfly") on Sunday,

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Then there's (tune - John Brown's Body):

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hehehe, i remember singing this one gill but you missed a verse

5. They spread on their bread when the vicar came to tea...

*grin* i particularly loved that verse, as all the adults in the vicinity would wince

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5. They spread on their bread when the vicar came to tea...

*grin* i particularly loved that verse, as all the adults in the vicinity would wince

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I'm not surprised - the scansion is painful. Crumpets would be fine, bread or toast no. Did you children have no aesthetic ear at all?

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Originally posted by Amos:
... I first ran into Louvin Brothers music at a show of the Mark Morris dance group ...

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Christmas Hate
...in that most famous carol "Once in Royal David's City" - the line "Christian children all must be/mild, obedient, good as he". What happened to raging against injustice? And what kind of woosy, Christian kids are we encouraging?

Kid's hate
God is better than Football,
God is better than beer,
God is better than cricket,
'Cos God's here all the year.
He isn't closed on Sundays,
He isn't stopped by rain,
He's better than your Captain
And you can talk to him again
(and again and again and again and again!)
God is better than football... to ...year

Wedding "songs"
for the Elvis impersonator in October - I once had to sing the Hawaian Wedding song ("Blue skies of Hawaii shine on this our wedding day" in suburban Adelaide) as the couple were having their honeymoon in Hawaii
- when will Sumserlerve be struck off? I had to sing "The Rose" just this afternoon...
- "Let's call the whole thing off" - has been done here but I wasn't there

All Saints
- we still do "Boomfer"

Bad matches
"At the name of Jesus" to the tune of "Puff the Magic Dragon" and something else to the tune of "Morningtown Ride"

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Originally posted by Altano:
Christmas Hate
...in that most famous carol "Once in Royal David's City" - the line "Christian children all must be/mild, obedient, good as he".

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To my great joy, this stanza was omitted in the ECUSA 1982 Hymnal.

"We have been crucified with Christ,
Now we shall live forever."

That would be the Christ who was crucified on our behalf, for our sins, so we *didn't* have to be up there with him.

"God has proclaimed the just reward,
'Life for all, alleluia.'"

God's reward seems to me to be totally unjust. A just response to humanity would definatley not be salvation. Yet God sent his son to us, in spite of ourselves.

Ah Lord You made the heavens
and the Earth.

Now this just seemed to be a bit of an acussatory attitude. Kind of like

Ah Lord You made the heavens and the earth but can You do this?(Starts patting head and rubbing stomach at same time.)

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Originally posted by da_musicman:
It goes something like this.

Ah Lord You made the heavens
and the Earth.

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Oh yes, from the recesses of my memory ... would the song be something more like:

Ah Lord God, Thou hast made the heavens,
And the earth with Thine outstretched arm.
<two more lines I can't remember; perhaps repeats>

Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Oh great and mighty God
Great in power and mighty in deed
Nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing
Nothing is too difficult for Thee.

Not as bad as some, though it does kind of go off the rails a bit.

To address some other points,

"We have been crucified with Christ" comes from Gal 2:20, and is biblical; it`s another example of the dying to self thing that Paul was (rightly) so keen on. I agree about the "just reward" being anything but though!

I knew a couple more verses to the 40,000 feet song, to be inserted between jumping and landing:

The girl who packed the parachutes forgot to pack the strings..
and she ain`t gonna jump no more!

The captain was the last to jump, the first to hit the ground..
and he ain`t gonna jump no more!

(And the chorus I knew had the second line
"Suspended by your braces when you don`t know how to fly")

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Originally posted by Altano:

Christmas Hate
...in that most famous carol "Once in Royal David's City" - the line "Christian children all must be/mild, obedient, good as he". What happened to raging against injustice? And what kind of woosy, Christian kids are we encouraging?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Altano:
Christmas Hate
...in that most famous carol "Once in Royal David's City" - the line "Christian children all must be/mild, obedient, good as he". What happened to raging against injustice? And what kind of woosy, Christian kids are we encouraging?

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Well, yo'ure certainly jerking this out of context. Did Christ, as a child, rage against injustice? If you think he did, you're not getting that from the Biblical record. The Bible says he was obedient to his parents (Luke 2:51). As all children should be (Eph 6:1, Col 3:20). And as the song you quote says they should be.

Kids (in my experience) are very poor judges of what is injustice and what isn't. For them, everyting is injust (or "not fair!" as they say) that doesn't follow some "rule" (often some rule the child him/herself has "intuited" i.e. made up to explain how s/he sees people behaving) to the letter.

Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them.

I don't know about "mild" but we've got obedience in spades here.

Do you know the tunes "Mack the Knife" and "Hernando's Hideaway"? (I don't know when they originally came out, but not lately.) Both, by the way, good songs. But try the words of "Jesus calls us, o'er the tumult" to the tune of "Mack the Knife" and the words of the Doxology to "Hernando's Hideaway."

Read your bible, pray every day
Pray every day, pray every day
Read your bible, pray every
Then you'll grow, grow, grow.

Then you'll grow, grow, grow
Then you'll grow, grow, grow (said Jesus)
Read your bible, pray every day
THen you'll grow, grow, grow

Can't remember other verses but the lyrics are something else. Wonder if that incredible piece of theology has anything to do with the fact that I am not 5'10"?

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Originally posted by Amos:
Yes, I have an absolute aversion to the vocalization of the tetragrammaton (i.e. saying "Yahweh"), but curiously don't mind "Jehovah" which is a much earlier attempt at the same thing. I think it's probably the pseudo-scientific "And this is how the ancient Hebrews did it" quality of "Yahweh" that is most offensive.

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Then you must hate the New Jerusalem Bible translation.

5-0-0-0 plus hungry folk.

Don't read your bible, forget to pray
forget to pray, forget to pray (x2)

and you'll shrink, shrink, shrink.
and you'll shrink, shrink, shrink.
and you'll shrink, shrink, shrink.

The full words to "I am a sheep" are:

I am a sheep baa baa and I like to stay well fed,
I am a sheep baa baa, a little stupid in the head,
I go astray most every day,
what a trouble I must be,
I'm glad I've got the good shepherd looking after me!
Ah-ha, ah-ha, baa, baa

Well, if its too much trouble for God....

Oh, and while I'm a ranting, I've just got back from 2K1 in Salford (this years answer to Message 2000) and Matt Redman was leading the worship. Has anyone heard "I'm making melodies in my heart to you". Coz its a good thing he was, coz that song certanly wasn't making melodies to God out loud. It was dirge!

afaik it goes:

i'm a jumper for my lord
and a sweater for my god
cos i jump and sweat and dance and shout and yell (yee har!)
i'm a jumper for my lord
and a sweater for my god
cos i'm clothed in robes of righteousness as well.

i'm enthusiastic for my god and that's the way to be.
god has filled my life with joy, i'll praise him and be free.
jesus is my special friend, he means so much to me,
i know that i will never be a christian misery.

i'm a jumper for my lord
and a sweater for my god....

*shudder* two more verses i have blocked from my memory

i do remember having to jump up and down.....

*sits in corner rocking quietly*

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Originally posted by icklejen:

Has anyone heard "I'm making melodies in my heart to you". Coz its a good thing he was, coz that song certanly wasn't making melodies to God out loud. It was dirge!

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This thread has really cheered me up. However, you've missed out my personal pet hate. We sang a song at primary school which went somethnig like this:

"The ink is black
The page is white
Together we learn
To read and write
To read and write"

... various otherthings were then black and white until we got to

"A child is black
A child is white
...."

This was meant to make us look on eachother as equals no matter what colour we were. However, at age 6, I had yet to realise that the black kids in my school could possibly be thought of as different because they were black. I wouldn't have described them in those terms, since that wasn't important whereas e.g. whether they were good at football or willing to lend me their crayons was. The song was the first thing to give me any inkling of the horrors of racism, despite being intended to do just the opposite! Also it had a dreadful tune.

In the bleak midwinter
Frosty wind made moan
Earth stood hard as iron
Water like a stone
Snow had fallen, snow on snow
Snow on snow [OK, OK, we get the message...]
In the bleak midwinter long ago.

So He was born on December 25th in Siberia them?

I suspect there are many on the Ship who would come to the defense of Christina Rosetti. I being one of them.

Ignoring the first verse, for example, you soon come to: "Our God, heav'n cannot hold him/nor earth sustain..."

Or the third verse: "What can I give him/poor as I am?..." and the poet concludes, "Yet what I can I give him: give my heart."

Granted, the hymn is northern hemispher-centric, but it's no more narratively confused then, for example, the First Noel.

Now I'm going to find myself humming both tunes all day, Tristan. It's your fault, and I don't forget this sort of thing....

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Originally posted by rachel_oliver:
The song was the first thing to give me any inkling of the horrors of racism, despite being intended to do just the opposite!

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yes, i remember this song well, and totally agree with you rachel. kids totally fail to distinguish between people in terms of colour, until adults *gently* point it out to them

i have a 7 year old friend, who has been friends with jenny since they were both 4. i have met jenny several times when i have been babysitting/childminding/whatnot. last time i was going to childmind, katie told me that jenny would be over, and added:

'she's my coloured friend.'

katie has *never* distinguished her this way before, and i'm saddened that she has now picked up colour differences.....

How did Moses cross the Red Sea (x3)
How did he get across?

Did he swim? No,no.
Did he fly? No, no?
(third line esccapes me)
How did he get across?

God blew with his wind, puff, puff, puff, puff
And he blew just enough, nuff, nuff, nuff, nuff
And through the sea he made a path
That's how they got across.

Imagine the actions and a first verse to a John Brown's body tune...

Okay, so there may not have been snow in Palestine. She is not trying to portay a historical, factual, rational account of a past event. She is writing, as an English woman, a poetic reflection on the nativity.

Incidentally does anyone like "Masters in this hall" as a Christmas carol? By William Morris I believe, with "God today hath poor folk raised, and cast adown the proud" (based on part of the Magnificat).

yes, the thread was 18 pages. when i tried to read pages 17 and 18, i got no posts, just the side bar etc i PM'ed david, and he/they/god changed the no of posts on each page to 50, which seems to have cleared up the problem.

i'm guessing ship-of-fools didn't like us having 18 page threads....... let's make some more and find out????

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Originally posted by Newman's Own:
I cannot recall all of the words, but it was a really inane tune with lyrics to the effect:He came down that we may have love (peace, joy), repeated three or four times.
It had to be the worst music I've ever heard, anywhere! Anyone else know this one?

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It's from the Cameroons, and you have actually remembered all the lyrics except the cantor line (why did he come) and the last line (Alleluia, forevermore). I'm guessing this one comes from the no paper/ low literacy tradition of repeat line one.

As for the thread shrinking: all the posts are still here, so it isn't the length of threads that we are altering. All the boards are on 50 posts per page, just because we wanted to try that out [not because you were having problems, viki].

This thread will not run to 18 pages again. If it keeps growing, it will be closed and restarted on a new thread.

It's a happy day, and I thank God for the weather.
It's a happy day, living it for my Lord.
It's a happy day, things are gonna get better, living each day by the promises in God's word.

It's a grumpy day, and I can't stand the weather.
It's a grumpy day, living it for myself.
It's a grumpy day, and things aren't gonna get better, living each day with my Bible up on my shelf.

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We are one in the Spirit,
We are one in the Lord
(Repeat thrice)
And we pray that all unity
Will one day be restored

Chorus:
And they'll know we are Christians
By our love, by our love
Yes, they'll know we are Christians
By our love.

We will walk with each other
We will walk hand in hand
(Repeat thrice)
And together we'll share the news
That God is in our land

CHORUS

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I think there were a few more verses too...

Also...

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Brother let me be your servant
Let me be as Christ to you.
Pray that I might have the grace
To let you be my servant too.
[Sung as ser-er-er-vant too]

We are pilgrims on a journey
We are [thankfully blocked out]
[Thankfully blocked out]
Walk the mile and share-are-are the load.

I will weep when you are weeping
When you laugh I'll laugh with you.
[Thankfully
blocked out]

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Sorry I cannot remember it all; though it may be a good thing. I remember "holding the Christ light" being a line somewhere there too.

Purge!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The one song that he penned that winds me up even more that shine Jesus shine is the Christingle song.

I think it was written for kids to sing, but our sunday scholl had immense trouble.

quote:

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We are one in the Spirit,
We are one in the Lord

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Brother let me be your servant
Let me be as Christ to you.
Pray that I might have the grace
To let you be my servant too.
[Sung as ser-er-er-vant too]

We are pilgrims on a journey
We are [thankfully blocked out]
[Thankfully blocked out]
Walk the mile and share-are-are the load.

The full verse is:

We are pilgrims on a journey
And companions on the road
We are here to help each other
Walk the mile and bear the load.

I will weep when you are weeping
When you laugh I'll laugh with you.
[Thankfully
blocked out]

The rest is:
We will share such joy and sorrow
'til we've seen this journey through.

Actually, I LIKE this rather a lot. It is more commonly sung now as Brother Sister Let me Serve You.

The verse about the Christ light is

I will hold the Christ light for you
in the night time of your fear;
I will hold my hand out to you,
speak the peace you long to hear.

Personally, there was a time when someone did that for me on a scale I can never repay. I honestly believe that I only kept going because I knew that on some level I was held, and safe. One day I hope to do the same for someone else.

It's the hymn I have always chosen for a welcome service when I start work in a new church, because it says so clearly what ministry is about (all ministry - not particularly ordained). The first line stresses the servant thing, but the last line of the first verse - pray that I may have the grace to let you be my servant too - shows that serving is not enough, we must be willing to allow ourselves to be served as well. Much harder I find. Those last two lines echo in my head every time I find myself starting to believe I can manage on my own. It is all right to be vulnerable, and all right to need help.

But all this is just my feeling. If you hate it, okay. But you're missing a great sing!

So light up the fire and let the flame burn,
Open the door let Jesus return,
Take the seeds of his Spirit, let the fruit grow,
Tell the people of Jesus, let his love show

Go through the park, on into the town,
The sun still shines on, it never goes down,
The light of the world is risen again,
The people of darkness are needing a friend.

Open your eyes, look into the sky,
The darkness has come, the sun came to die,
The evening draws on, the sun disappears,
But Jesus is living, his Spirit is near.

I suppose thinking about it the words it is not such a bad song...quite pleasant in fact.

I suppose what made it hellish was the way it was sung. People had their heads down, it was sung at a very VERY slow pace, and after singing this song (often towards the end of the service) people would often walk out without so much as a 'Hello'. Kind of grated on me that a song about serving invoked such an un-serving reaction.