Will You Come and Follow Me (ELW 798)
1 “Will you come and follow me if I but call
your name? Will you go where you don’t
know and never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown, will you let my
name be known, will you let my life be
grown in you and you in me?”
2 “Will you lwave yourself behind if I but call
your name? Will you care for cruel and
kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare, should your life attract or scare? Wil you let me answer
pray’r in you and you in me?”
3 “Will you let the blinded see if I but call
your name? Will you set the pris’ners
free and never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean, and do such as
this unseen, and admit to what I
mean in you and you in me?”
4 “Will you love the you you hide if I but call
your name? Will you quell the fear inside and never be the same?
Will you use the faith you’ve found to reshape the
world around, through my sight and touch and
sound in you and you in me?”
5 Lord, your summons echoes true when you but call
my name. Let me turn and follow
you and never be the sameIn your company I’ll o where your love and
footsteps show. Thus I’ll move and live and
grow in you and you in me.
Text: John L. Bell and Graham Maule, © 1987, WGRG c/o Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc., agent
Reprinted under OneLicense.net #A730924
Devotion
My grandmother Hilda’s sister, Sarah, of Lowry, MN, had been corresponding with Dr. John Dyrnes, a medical missionary in Madagascar. In 1906, Sarah accepted John’s marriage proposal. She traveled alone by train and ship to Madagascar, where she and John were married shortly after she arrived. They worked together for thirty-four years (John as a doctor; Sarah as a teacher) until her death in 1940. When God called their names, Sarah and John were willing to go where God wanted them to go.
St. Mark’s Lutheran Church’s north sanctuary wall was all windows. During the summer months, the resident across the street to the north often chose Sunday morning, when the people in St. Mark’s were worshipping, to mow his lawn. At a council meeting a member suggested hanging heavy curtains along the north wall “so we can’t see” the man. But another council member responded, “But he won’t be able to see us either.”
God calls us by name to serve wherever we are living, wherever God wants us to go.
Prayer
Almighty God, many of your servants have gone before us, teaching and serving in your name. We thank you for them, and we pray when you call us to walk a similar path, we will say, “Yes, Lord!” Amen.