TEAM RECTOR
Fr. George Moffat writes:
"Change and decay in all around I see:
0 thou who changest not, abide with me."
Henry Francis Lyte based this hymn on the encounter of the two disciples with Jesus on the Emmaus Road. There, at the end of their journey, Jesus broke bread before them and they recognised him as the risen and living Lord... (Luke 24: 13-35.) That scene is captured in stone in the reredos in St. Paul’s. The focus of the Church’s worship for 150 years of witness has been the revealing of the risen and living Lord in the breaking of bread. The Eucharistic fellowship of the people of God remains and continues to be central to the work and witness in St. Paul’s, Manningham. Henry Lyte was dying of consumption, aged 54, when he wrote that hymn in his Devonshire fishing parish, yet the hymn while being about death is also about the faith that faces the future
fearlessly and triumphantly on the light of the cross and empty tomb. The Christian knows that because Jesus died sin has been dealt with and put away; and because he lives death has been overcome, and the gates of everlasting life been thrown open wide. Because of that foes are not feared, there is neither sting to death nor victory to grave. Life and futures remain in God’s hands. That vibrant faith is central to our lives today in the ordinary living of people in St. Paul’s. From it comes creativity and engagement with neighbours from many foreign lands, most recently those from Pakistan and Bangladesh. This is valued and appreciated by many, not least by those who were involved in the Report on the Disturbances of June 1995 and those who valued the development of the Manningham Mills Community Association with its great Challenge to the Community in October 1997. This witness to the redemptive love of God in Jesus Christ continues to demonstrate the power of the Holy Spirit working. That we are ever ready to respond to His promptings will remain a daily feature of the Church’s witness in Manningham and to Manningham for the sake of the Gospel.