Praise to the Name

Educated at Cambridge University, Timothy Dudley-Smith was ordained in 1950 as assistant curate of St Paulâs Church, Northumberland Heath. From 1953 he was head of the Cambridge University Mission in Bermondsey, London, and in the 1960s served as secretary of the Church Pastoral Aid Society. In 1973 he became Archdeacon of Norwich and in 1981 Bishop of Thetford; he retired in 1991. He is a Fellow of the Hymn Society of the United States and Canada, and in 2003 was appointed an honorary vice-president of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland. In the same year he was awarded an OBE for services to hymnody.

Here are 36 hymns written between 2005 and 2008 since the author's last anthology, A Door for the Word. What makes this book especially interesting is the second half wherein Bishop Dudley-Smith gives a detailed account of the genesis and theology of each hymn. Between two and five tunes are suggested for each text and there are the usual indexes of Biblical references, metre, themes and subjects.

• Foreword ; A city strong we claim as ours ; A heart of love the Lord displays ; A man to Christ committed ; As one in Christ the Lord ; Behold, the kingdom is the Lord's ; Child of Mary, softly sleeping ; Christ bids us break the bread ; Christ is the shining sun of all our days ; Come, rejoice with all things living ; Draw near with God, he is not far to seek ; Draw near to God in humble adoration ; Fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers ; Freed in Christ from death and sin ; From the deep places, hear my cry ; God who formed the mighty ocean ; In Christ is all I need ; Jesus, the saving Name ; Jesus the Son ; Last of the great prophetic line ; Let this prayer, O Lord, be granted ; Lift high your hearts in blessing ; Light on the path, a lamp about our way ; Light to the world, a child is born ; O cross, between whose branches bare ; O God of heaven, from whose hand ; O God, whose angels see your face ; Our God and Father, whose eternal mind ; 'Peace be to you,' was Jesus' word ; Rejoice in God, my heart ; Songs in the night, at Jesus' birth ; The Lord is king, enthroned in might ; To God, our God, the nation's Lord ; Whom God has summoned by his word ; Whose is the voice which makes the winds to blow? ; Whose mighty word the heavens made? ; Wonder of all wonders ; Notes on the hymns ; Indexes ; Index of Biblical references ; Themes from the church calendar ; Metrical index ; Index of suggested tunes ; Index of themes and subjects ; Index of first lines