At Greenbelt Festival, there is a new tradition of hymn singing in the big beer tent.

I stayed away this year, as it becomes very crowded- and the volume of the singing has to be heard to be believed. On one occasion I was about a mile away over the other side of the festival fields, and you could hear the singing clearly above the sounds coming from the mega-amplified main stage.

Here is a clip that gives a flavour of the event. What you see is a hymn choosing process, then a few thousand folk singing ‘Lord the light of your love is shining’.

The beers and hymns event has been criticised by some. As you can see, for some, the beer is central to proceedings- and perhaps the idea of beer-fueled worship, cast alongside the instructions for ‘orderly worship’ by St Paul is a step too far.

But then, if you speak to people who were there, with tears in their eyes as they worshiped…

How this transfers to your town or congregation- who knows!