Rev’d Geoff and Hope Price
Readings for Sunday: Deuteronomy 8.7-10; Matthew 6.25-34
To hear Geoff’s sermon click on the arrow below
The Intercessions for Rogation Sunday
First, a prayer of thanks for the year to date.
Dear Lord, thank you for the miracle of Spring;
Seeing the braird of corn burst from bare soil gives such reassurance, such promise, or at very least hope.
Watching lambs pop out, snort and stagger to their tottering feet, and aided by mum find their way to the nipple. How does that just happen?
The Blackthorn, the May, and blossom in orchard and garden. This must be the best Cowslip year ever. For the hope/promise of another harvest.
We thank you for all the seasons and most earnestly pray that however much they may alter they will continue for ever.
Surviving a succession of agricultural depressions ranks high in farmer’s family folk law. Thank you for financial support from Government, that is you and I dear tax payer – even if farmers complain that it is too little and constantly altering, it has meant 100 years without a real depression.
Lord, in your mercy…
Dear Lord, we remember 25 years ago the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease epidemic, with 71 confirmed cases in the County centred on the Forest of Dean. Thousands of sheep, cattle and pigs were slaughtered on those farms and farms contiguous to them. Footpaths were closed and rural tourism decimated. Awful to have your life’s work building a flock or herd wiped out, shot in front of you; at least there was financial compensation. Some of those doing the actual shooting are still suffering PTSD. Not forgetting the trauma suffered by our beloved animals. All farmers felt trapped on their farms fearing even to go shopping for fear of bringing the disease back.
Lord, we thank you that we have been largely free of the disease for the last 25 years and fervently pray that we may continue to be.
Lord, in your mercy…
Next a request to prosper our crops.
As a country producing only 60% and falling, of our temperate footstuffs, and following on last year’s much reduced harvest of both grain and animal fodder, dear Lord, we ask for both sun and rain – so that as in Psalm 65, “the pastures are clothed with flocks and the valleys stand so thick with corn, that they shall laugh and sing”.
Lord, in your mercy…
A prayer for rain.
Lord, you and I know, but the congregation might not, that a wheat crop will use an inch of rain a week at this time of year, and our thin Cotswold soils can only hold 4 inches. Give us the blessing of regular rain – through to the day before St Swithin’s please – and then in view of the doubling of farm diesel price, a dry hot spell for Harvest.
Lord, in your mercy…
A prayer for adapting to change.
Just as John Tame made his fortune from wool, keeping a sheep as long as its teeth held out, but now a fleece is hardly worth shearing. 60 years ago, Ken Iles’s dairy herd would cross Park Street four times a day for milking, but now the nearest milking herd is five miles away. Today, Tom Paton is diversifying into a Dog Walking paddock, a photovoltaic array, and workshops instead of spring barley. Help us, Lord, to adapt to change, whether climate, government dictat, or Tump/Putin induced.
We humbly pray for this help, not for ease or leisure, but to be able, just like this church, to balance the books and keep going.
Merciful Father…
Intercessions by Chris Peachey
From Rev’d Caroline Symcox – 01285 712467 – carolinesymcox@googlemail.com
Readings for Sunday: Deuteronomy 8.7-10; Matthew 6.25-34
The following is taken from the Parish Newsletter for Sunday 17th May 2026
This Sunday we mark Rogationtide, a time of reflection on God’s Creation, the natural world around us, and those who live and work in close connection with the natural world and the countryside. Traditionally this would be a time when we would ‘Beat the Bounds’ – walking the entire boundary of the parish as we pray for the countryside, our communities, and most particularly the farmers and countryside workers. On Sunday we aren’t going to walk that far, so as not to exclude the people for whom that would be a tough walk to make, but we will be starting our service outside. There in the open air we will pray for all God’s wonderful Creation.
One of the most wonderful elements of reflecting on the beauty of Creation is to notice and give thanks for God’s glorious abundance. God showers us with abundance in Creation – in nature, in people and in his Word to us. On Sunday we take time to accept and treasure this outpouring of God’s gifts.
I’m sure we all can think of a moment when the glory and abundance of God’s world has broken into our understanding. Perhaps there was a moment when we were surrounded by incredible mountains, or deep in a forest, or looking into an ocean teeming with life. Sometimes such moments can hit us even closer to home. Looking up to see a red kite circling overhead, walking through a churchyard, or seeing a field filling with growing crops. Jesus reminds us in his words to the gathered crowd that God has provided for and loves his creation: ‘Consider the lilies of the field…’ and in this period we indeed take time to consider.
We know indeed that God has promised to us a new heaven and a new earth, eternal life beyond this one, but that doesn’t mean that the here and now is any less glorious or blessed. “God saw all that he had created, and saw that it was very good.” So let’s work to cultivate an appreciation of his abundance in the everyday!
Rev’d Caroline
Updated 19th May 2026