Well lookee here St. James's Cambridge, MA parishioners (and other people of goodwill)



I took myself over to Lakeland FL  (75 - 80 miles away) on 6th June to have dinner with an old friend, Dana L Robert.

 Cambridge folks know her best as a Professor at B.U.; as  member of Harvard-Epworth Methodist Church;  and as the mother of Sam and John Massie (who were at St. James's most Sundays, but occasionally also at Harvard -Epworth).

 The wider international Church knows, values and respects  her as the Truman Collins Professor of World Christianity and history of mission at Boston University. 

 see:

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dana_L._Robert

 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Dana was in Lakeland to address the Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church.

 Of course we wanted to see and and enjoy each other (after many years) hence our gathering for dinner.   What a joy, what a pleasure, what a Spirit-given blessing to be together.

 I have enough of a Methodist heritage (I was baptised at Eastville Methodist Church, Bristol, U.K.) to know the hymn which is sung at the beginning of Methodist Conferences throughout the world. 
So I printed copies of the words (see below) so that she and I could read it aloud as our grace before dinner.

 "And are we yet alive and see each other's face? Glory and thanks to Jesus give for his Almighty grace"  

 Amen and alleluia from Dana and from me!

------------------------------------------------------------


1. And are we yet alive,
and see each other's face?
Glory and thanks to Jesus give
for his almighty grace!

2. Preserved by power divine
to full salvation here,
again in Jesus' praise we join,
and in his sight appear.

3. What troubles have we seen,
what mighty conflicts past,
fightings without, and fears within,
since we assembled last!

4. Yet out of all the Lord
hath brought us by his love;
and still he doth his help afford,
and hides our life above.




Here it is, sung by a solo voice






As Dana pointed out, in the days of Methodist Circuit Riders in the
U.K. and the U.S.A.  there was no guarantee that the preachers would still be alive from year to year.











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