Prayer, day 2184: 2nd Sunday After Pentecost C

Arise my soul
and give to the Holy One thanks and praise,
who has carried me in safety throughout the night
and sheltered me within the tenderness of God's embrace.

Beloved Savior,
you provide for us abundantly,
teaching us and leading us in compassion and mercy:
may we walk in your ways with mindfulness and faith.

As you turned the water into wine in Cana, Lord,
so turn our hearts from stone to flesh,
that we may produce abundant love in the world.
May we serve You, Blessed Jesus,
as we care for each other,
seeking out the lost and the hurting,
the oppressed and the fearful,
standing alongside those in need
as one body.

Spirit of the Living God,
fill us to overflowing with your grace and truth,
and pour out your blessing and comfort
on those for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer 2183

Blessed Redeemer,
we abide under the awning of your mercy,
and rest within the shade of your right hand:
praise and glory to You forever!

Set our feet firmly in the path of peace,
and give us the determination and the will
to be guided by justice and mercy
as we walk in your Way.

Give us hearts thirsty for your wisdom,
that we may seek the protection of the oppressed
and stand resolute in unity with the humble.

Make us pure in spirit
and steadfast in integrity and love,
faithfully living our lives to reflect your compassion.

Abundant Spirit,
bless and keep us, we humbly pray,
that we may embody your truth,
and grant endurance and healing to all for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer 2182

Eternal Breath of Life,
inhabit our hearts and minds;
transform us by your grace
that we may witness to your beauty.

In wonder and awe,
we consider the works of your hands, O Creator,
and see with new eyes
the glory of your radiance in every living thing
formed by your wisdom.

Call us into renewed understanding
of your gospel message of love and compassion, O God,
and set us aglow by your Spirit of Healing.

Extend the canopy of your mercy
over all whose hope is in You, Beloved Lord,
as we pray in your Holy Name.

Amen.

Prayer 2181

Holy One,
we bow the knee of our hearts,
and give you thanks for your mercy and grace,
the foundation of our lives.

Lord, we confess to you our sins and offenses,
that we may repent
and honor the dignity of all
and live in the Way of Love.

May we examine the source of our comforts
and the extent that they come
at the expense and exploitation of others.

May we rebuke and resist the powers of empire
that use poverty and want
as a tool to divide and conquer.

May we proclaim Christ's gospel of healing
and embody the wisdom of compassion
in all our ways.

Let us joyfully proclaim God's abundant mercy
in our words and deeds,
and testify to the glories of your love, O Savior.

Manifest your presence to all who cry to you,
and rest your protecting hand upon all for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2180

(Inspired by Psalm 25)
O Loving One,
we cast ourselves into your embrace;
we rest upon your breast and know peace.
In You we put our trust:
we will never be shaken,
for You are our God,
and You watch over us as we sleep.
Our rest is in You through the watches of the night, 
and our hope is in You all through the day.

Lord Jesus, teach us your ways,
that we may never let our feet slip from the path of the Almighty. 
We rejoice in your healing power, O Spirit of Wisdom,
and raise up praises for all God's blessing and mercy.

You are gracious and tender to us
in our loneliness or affliction, O Lord:
You bear us up when we are weary.
O Merciful God, receive our humble offerings of thanks,
and hear our petitions for those who name.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2179

Most Merciful God,
You have called us to be your daughters and your sons,
illumined by the light of Heaven:
hear our prayer.

Help us to pray through our brother Christ,
to be reconciled to You and to each other,
for that is the greatest prayer of all.

Let all we do today be a prayer and a praise to You,
for You are our true home,
our Lover and our Creator.

Holy One, unite our hearts in hope,
and through your grace bring them before your altars,
offered to you as our humble gift.

Burnish our souls with your grace and compassion,
and mend them where they have been battered,
O Great Physician.

Gather us up within a cloud of your blessing,
and grant your peace especially
to those whom we now name.

Amen.

739

Prayer 2178

Blessed be your Name, O Merciful God,
who holds all worlds within your loving hand:
accept our prayers and praises
we humbly offer before You.

Gather us under the shelter of your wing, O Holy One,
and keep us as the apple of your eye,
that we may serve you,
refreshed in spirit and enlightened by your truth.
Your truth is this:
we are made to love You and each other,
and to embody your work
of forgiveness,
healing,
and renewal.

Consecrate our hands to your service, O Christ,
and send your Holy Spirit to lead us in integrity and wisdom.
Pour out your grace upon our hearts,
and your peace upon those for whom we pray.

Amen.

Claimed as Beloved: Homily for the First Sunday After Epiphany C (The Baptism of Our Lord)

In this week’s gospel, we fast-forward about 30 years. Last week, we still had the infant Jesus being acknowledged as holy by the Wise Men. This week, Jesus and his cousin John are grown men, and John has been engaged in his ministry as the prophet who foretells the coming of the Holy One of God.

As our Gospel reminds us, the people are filled with expectation. John’s preaching of repentance and pronouncement of the sinfulness of the people has had a galvanizing effect on the people who have come from all over to hear him. John pulls no punches: In the gospel of John it is recorded that when the leading men of the people show up to hear his message, he calls them a “brood of vipers.” Nice. 

Such preaching might be met with fear and shame—except that John also combined his preaching with baptism. The meaning of baptism at the time of John was a ritual cleansing—it did not wash away sins, but indicated someone’s desire to live a purer life. Baptism was also a ritual anointing—a setting apart of someone. John urges his followers to be baptized to prepare for the coming of the kingdom of God. That’s why, even though John’s preaching was of the “fire and brimstone” variety, the people are nonetheless filled with expectation.

And then Jesus himself takes his place in line at the river Jordan. Other gospel versions of this story show John protesting the idea that he, a lowly prophet, should baptize Jesus. We don’t get that protest here. We also don’t get a description of the actual baptism. Instead, Jesus’s baptism takes place off-stage; it happens as a matter-of-fact.

In Luke’s story, after Jesus is so casually baptized, he is praying. Jesus’ prayers are often the openings to incredible revelations, and this is emphasized in Luke. This is first of many incidents of prayer leading to important crossroads or dramatic events. Jesus’ prayer here results in pulling apart the division between the heavenly realm and Earth, and elicits God’s praise and acknowledgment of Jesus as Son. This is a reminder for us all about the power of prayer, and how vital it is for our spiritual life to engage in a practice of prayer, of conversation with and listening to God. The heavens open- releasing the Holy Spirit to guide Jesus’ ministry. And when we pray, we enter into that sacred space too between heaven and Earth.

Thus, when Jesus prays immediately after his baptism, the heavens are opened, and a voice comes from heaven, saying: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well-pleased.” For us, baptism is emphasized as the initiation ritual for entering Christ’s one, holy, universal church. Especially since we practice infant baptism, we don’t emphasize baptism as a way to wash away sins. We emphasize that the action that washes away our sins, instead, is true repentance—turning away from the easy sins, like complacency or pronounced powerlessness in the face of evil, and determining instead to deliberately choose life and witness that God is greater than human contempt and selfishness.

Yet there are still some parts of the Christian Church that teaches that baptism washes away one’s sins. And you know, a question arises: if Jesus is without sin, why does he undergo baptism? Perhaps one way to think of this is that Jesus is seeking a mikveh—a ritual immersion used in Judaism for consecration. Mikvehs established ritual purity. The requirements were that the water preferably should be “living” or free-flowing water from a stream or river, if at all possible. This is why the other gospels tell us that John was baptizing in the Jordan. This is also why every baptism we perform at St. Martin’s, like the one we will celebrate during the bishop’s visit, includes a drop of water from the Jordan river mixed into the other water.

Although mikvehs were used after coming into contact with uncleanliness and illness, it was also used to purify and consecrate priests. “Christ” means “anointed one.” For Luke, Jesus’ baptism itself is not that important—he shares it with others (and is baptized toward the end of a group of people). In his baptism he is not so much set apart in Luke’s story; rather he is anointed to take up the full ministry he has come among us to do: to reconcile us, to reveal who God is to us in a way that we can understand, and to show us how to live our lives to the full potential of our humanity, which is God’s dream for us all along. A dream we so often fall short of. A dream that God still has for us, and to which God calls us to return.

Jesus comes among us to reveal how to fully embody and claim our humanity, made in the image of God. In Luke’s story we are reminded that Jesus is BOTH God’s son, and is one of us. In taking his place among others as part of a group of people being baptized, Jesus reminds us of his solidarity with us, of his experiencing all the things we do.

We are called to the imitation of Christ is all our ways. Through baptism, through imitation of Christ, through prayer to strengthen us in our own path of discipleship, we know that we too have heard a voice calling to us: “You are my child, the Beloved; with you I am well-pleased.” With these words, God claims Jesus publicly as God’s Son, and inaugurates Jesus’s public ministry among us. We hear God’s enduring delight in those who do God’s will.

If we had been able to meet today, one of the things we would have done is to be reminded of our baptism by aperging. So, as we are instead surrounded by about a foot of frozen water, oh irony!-- I ask that you remember your baptism.

Remember that you are claimed and beloved by God.

Remember that God promises NEVER to leave us defenseless or alone. From Isaiah today, we hear a reminder of God’s enduring love and faithfulness: “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you….”


God calls all of us God’s children. And what a precious, precious reminder that is!

In our baptism, in our life of discipleship, in our devotion to God and to each other: this is how we live out our being claimed by God. In this Epiphany season, may we continue to open the eyes of our hearts to see the signs of God’s love and faithfulness all around us, the wonders of God’s creation ongoing within us, calling us to renewal and a deeper devotion as disciples and witnesses. May we hear within the heart God’s calling us and claiming us as God’s children, and go out engaged in our own ministry of revealing that wonder to the world.

Amen.

Preached at Morning Prayer via Facebook Live at 10:15 am, Sunday, January 13, due to cancellation of services at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, after Winter Storm Gia gifted us with over a foot of snow.


Readings:
Isaiah 43:1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8:14-17
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Images:
1) David Zelenka, The Baptism of Christ, 2005, from wikimedia commons.
2) He Qi, The Baptism of Christ, Chinese.
3) David Bonnell, The Baptism of the Christ.
4) Medieval illumination of the Baptism of Christ.
5) James Tissot, The Baptism of Jesus, 19th century, French.

Prayer 2177: 1st Sunday After Epiphany (The Baptism of Our Lord)

Holy One,
your voice calls to us lovingly,
claiming us as your children:
we worship you in the beauty of holiness
and praise your name with all our being.

As our Savior was baptized
and began his work among us through prayer,
we lift our heart to You in prayer, O God,
and embrace your will in our lives.

You have claimed us as your own;
you are acquainted with all our ways:
let us remember our baptism
and dedicate ourselves to the work of healing,
of reconciliation and compassion for all.

Almighty God, Merciful Redeemer,
send your Spirit upon us
that we may be anointed to our service of witness
and embody Christ's example of holiness in the world.

Bless and keep those
who turn to you in hope and trust, O God,
and lay your hand of protection of comfort
on those for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2176: Inspired by Psalm 90

O God our Refuge,
we find our home in You,
Who welcomes all who wander,
all who seek shelter and protection.

O Merciful One,
you bring us under the shadow of your wing,
and turn away no one who seeks You:
may we embody your mercy and lovingkindness,
humbly giving thanks for your salvation and love.

Lord God,
forgive us our faithlessness and cynicism,
our consumption without concern for tomorrow
or the needs of those around us:
set our hearts again within your law of love,
and strengthen us in integrity and communion.

Teach us to number our days,
O Spirit of Wisdom,
that we may apply the time you have given us 
to growing in compassion and discernment,
pursuing justice and reconciliation
with hearts grateful for your saving grace.

In the name of Jesus,
grant your comfort and rest
to those whose needs we now lift before You, as we pray.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2175

O God, look with favor upon your servants today.

Let us turn our hearts toward those who,
in the midst of plenty,
are in want in body or soul.
Let us hunger for justice and redemption
as much as we hunger for food.
Let us remember how love has blessed us in our lives,
and let go of discontent and rancor.

Help us to stop building a mountain of our resentments,
and dwell instead within the mansion of our blessings.

Give your protection
to those who are in danger from the cold this day,
and let us work to give them shelter as our own.
Comfort those whose needs we bring before You.

Amen.

Prayer 2174

Let us rise and give thanks
for the abundant love of God,
who creates, sustains, and redeems us
in steadfast lovingkindness.

Make us faithful in all our endeavors,
that they may conform to the loving Way of Jesus.

May we be generous and compassionate
in our care of all whom we meet,
and walk gently upon the earth.

Increase our strength within us, O God,
that we may serve you with greater devotion
and testify to your lovingkindness and grace.

You bend near in tenderness
to all who call upon You, O Holy One:
bless and keep safe all those for whom we pray.

Amen.

Prayer 2173: Inspired by Psalm 121

I lift the eyes of my spirit
to my Creator and Protector,
who is my sure and certain help
even in the darkest hour.

Lord, you hold me fast,
even as tempests buffet,
even as the cords of death entangle me.

Place my feet within your gates,
O Holy One,
that I may lift my heart in praise,
and abide forever in your courts.

I rest under the shield of your mercy,
O Watchman of my Soul:
your prayer is ever upon my lips.

Grant us a portion of your Spirit,
O Lord of Life,
and grant the blessing of your peace
to all who call upon You.

Amen.

Stilling the Soul: Speaking to the Soul, January 9, 2019

So often the daily office provides a salve for the soul when we need it the most. Tonight during evening prayer, one of our psalms is one of my favorites: Psalm 131. I often pray this psalm at night before I go to sleep. I find it especially comforting when I consider the psalm that precedes it, Psalm 130, which begins,

Out of the depths have I called to you, O Lord;
Lord, hear my voice,
let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication….

The word for “depths” is the one used to speak of ocean deeps, a place at the very center of our being, yet dark and remote. For the people who first prayed this psalm, especially, the sea was a place of mystery and danger. Thus, the psalmist, in trying to express the extent of his feeling of desolation and alienation, creates an image of waters rising over his head and pulling him under.

And haven’t we all felt that way, at one time or another? Yet hope still rings through Psalm 130, singing of waiting in patience and trust:

My soul waits for the Lord,
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.

And then, when we arrive on the far shore of Psalm 130’s lament, we encounter Psalm 131’s appeal to simplicity and trust, with a beautiful image of a child soothed and comforted on her mother’s breast:

O Lord, I am not proud;
I have no haughty looks.
I do not occupy myself with great matters,
Or with things that are too hard for me.
But I still my soul and make it quiet,
Like a child upon its mother’s breast;
My soul is quieted within me.
O Israel wait upon the Lord,
From this time forth forevermore.

The gentleness and humility of one in awe and wonder before the immenseness of God’s love and care is invoked in Psalm 131, enticing us to be brave enough to cast away the brittle contempt and disregard that refuses to countenance the worth and value of the Other that seems to be the coin of the realm today. Yet, if we started from a position of gratitude for the gentleness of God’s care for us, how could we turn away from those who ask for our help?

Stilling the soul.

Remembering the promise of grace, the abundant mercy of the One who seeks to open our hearts. 

Trusting in the love that is our companion always.

In the peace and quiet of a soul at rest,
let me make my prayer to You,
O Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer.

As I awaken
and open my eyes to receive morning's light,
may I also awaken my spirit
and open my heart to receive your love, O God,
My Strength and My Shield.
Set my feet upon the path of justice, integrity, and peace,
O Radiant Spirit of Wisdom:
let me walk humbly and reverently
upon this good Earth you have hallowed, O Lord.

When I am troubled,
may I sigh and turn into your shoulder,
knowing I am your precious child, O Savior,
safe upon your breast,
soothed within your tender embrace,
enveloped within a mother's protection and care.

Merciful One,
guide and direct me by your abundant grace,
that I may serve the cause of love today
as a witness to the reconciling power of Christ.
Give respite and ease
to all who are troubled in body, mind, or spirit,
O Holy One,
and extend the shade of your blessing
over all who turn to You.

Amen.




Image: Mother and Child, by Renoir.


This was first published at the Episcopal Cafe's Speaking to the Soul on January 9, 2019.

Prayer, day 2172

Blessed Savior,
we sit in peace before You,
worshipping You in the beauty of holiness,
praising you for all your blessings.

Forgive us our callous disregard
for the lives of others,
for our infliction of pain,
for our apathy and silence before evil.

You have called us to live in integrity and shalom:
may we follow in the Way of Jesus,
the way of healing and mercy.

Awaken and renew our determination
to love others as ourselves,
and to respect the dignity of every person

 Give us wise and empathetic hearts,
that we never look on the suffering of others
without compassion and a will to help.

With an open and generous hand You guide us:
accept our prayers as we seek to serve You,
each other, and all creation.

Lord Christ,
place the mantle of your protection, we pray,
over those we remember before You now.

Amen.

Prayer, day 2171

Through the depths of the night,
You have watched over me,
O Lover of Souls:
may your Spirit guide me in love and justice.

May I walk in the Way of Jesus this day,
and set my heart
upon your Law of Love and Healing.
May I open my heart fully to receive your grace,
and remember and give praise
for your saving help.

Lord, when I stumble,
pick me up and set me back on your path:
let your Wisdom be a lamp for my feet.

Animate me
by a spirit of humility, reconciliation, and compassion,
guided by love and charity,
to fulfill your will.

Our hope is in You, O Holy One:
place your mantle of healing
over those we now name, as we pray.

Amen.

Home Another Way: Sermon for Epiphany C

We’ve heard the story a thousand times before. We’ve seen in our mind the swaying gait of the camels, the precious gifts strapped to the saddle, smelled the faint scent of exotic spices from faraway lands clinging to their clothes. Even their names are exotic—even by Biblical standards: Caspar, Melchior, Balthasazar.

And so they head to the main town in this dusty little country. Surely, they assume, the people in this big town would know what the signs mean, what the star means. And that’s how they encounter Herod. They stop off in Jerusalem assuming that of course everyone would both also know about this miracle in their own midst. They also assume that everyone, including Herod, would be just as welcoming to this development as they are. But of course, Herod is not in any way devout—understatement of the year, there—and sees this development only as a threat to his worldly power. 

Herod was, by all accounts, a ruthless, calculating wanna-be despot. He listened to the foreigners’ descriptions of Jewish prophecies about this baby, and I bet he felt something snap in the back of his head. Jesus as a baby is recognized as someone worthy of worship by these foreigners, and as a half-Jewish pretend prince, a quisling sell-out who rules only with the backing of a mighty empire, Herod sees only a rival to his frail grip on power, and deposed kings all too often are dead kings. Herod feels the cold breath of danger whistling down the back of his neck.

Yet even though not Jews, the Magi school Herod in Jewish prophecy and scripture. They come to pay homage to a child born, according to prophecy, as king of the Jews, and even more, as the Prince of Peace. And so Herod, wily as the serpent in Eden, rearranges his face in what he though looked like an innocent expression of joy. “Once you find the baby, please come back and tell me where he is, so that I may worship him too,” he lisps, and the Magi bow their way out. On to following that star again.

They find the baby in a house and are allowed in to see the mother and child. The child awakens just as they walk in. As each one took that baby into his arms, he looked into those beautiful brown eyes, and saw the swirling of constellations and supernovae. They see the beauty of the ages before time began. After handing the baby back to his mother, they offer their gifts with trembling hands. And the baby settled against his mother’s neck, sighed, and returned to dreaming with his dimpled, star-shaped hands spread wide.

Yet what they had just seen still swirled before them. Overcome by the wisdom in those newborn eyes, the Magi worshiped the baby. And, in fact, it’s one of the few times in the Gospels that Jesus is worshipped. As an adult, Jesus always stopped people from worshiping him. Worship is easy. Following the Way of Jesus is much harder.

As Episcopal theologian Verna Dozier notes in her book, The Dream of God, in every instance of Jesus’s adult life, when someone attempted to worship Jesus, he stopped them, asking them instead to do the harder thing and FOLLOW him: 

Worship is setting Jesus on a pedestal, distancing him, enshrining (enshrouding) him in liturgies, stained glass windows, Biblical translations, medallions, pilgrimage to places where he walked—the whole nine yards. Following him is doing what he did, weeping over situation that was so far removed from the dream of God and spending his life to make it different. Following is discipleship…. Following Jesus is having that clear eyed vision of whom we serve.” (Dozier, 1148)

So of course the Magi worshiped. But I am convinced they emerged from that worship and that encounter changed. I like to think that at some point Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar came back to hear the young rabbi preach, and that they moved from worship to discipleship. As we are all called to do.

And so it is for us today. I am convinced that sometimes people worship a frozen statue of Jesus, one who lives only in the pages of a holy book, rather than the living breathing savior who is active in the world today. Lots of people may scoff at that claim. But the best way we can all see and hear and walk with Jesus is by being his disciples in the world. By welcoming the stranger and the destitute to our table. By seeing his face in the face of the hungry, the homeless, the foreigner. Too many people use the name of Christ to advance their own agendas, to justify their own actions.

It’s easy for us to gather around an altar and worship. But the best altar Jesus stakes a claim on, the one that will change the world the most, is not made of wood or steel or stone but of human flesh. Jesus calls us to follow him, to make an altar in our hearts and minds and acclaim him as our great high priest standing before it to lead us into true discipleship after we leave the doors of this place. 

Many of us wish for a star to show us the way. Instead, too often we find ourselves groping about in the dark, lost, lonely, afraid. Yet, sometimes, if we take a deep breath or several, we can open ourselves to the in-breaking of God into our lives, and hear that call to follow our own star of hope that seeks to lead us home by another way.

The way of hope. 

 The way of justice.

The way of integrity. 

 The way of wisdom.

And I think the Magi show us a lot about how to do that. They used both their reason and their intuition to find the Christ-child. They not only used their eyes, but their imaginations. They knew, as we have forgotten, that dreams are not foolishness, but sometimes the only things that allow us to make great leaps of faith.

In the post-Enlightenment world, reason has sought to overcome all that is sacred, all that is mysterious. The aim and outcome has been to control the unknown. We are told too often that dreams are foolish, that they lead to frivolously frittering our lives away. But it is only through having a dream, of being willing to be guided by that dream, that change ever happens. A dream of the kind I am talking about leads us into redirecting what is toward a better what will be. A dream that shines like the light of a star to guide us. A dream filled with the holy light of justice and freedom in our own time, like that famous dream of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

What those Wise men looked at was Love Incarnate—God’s yearning, passion, and com-passion for us in a frail human shape. God’s son came and dwelled among us to make absolutely manifest how we were made to live—for God—and for each other. As our Presiding Bishop says, “If it’s not about love, it’s not about God.

And we want God to love us, but real love shakes you up and spins you around, and we aren’t too sure we want that. We often like to think we can manage relationships. The miracle is that God’s love is not manageable. It’s not reasonable—and that’s what the coming of the Christ-child teaches us. And yet love is the signal marker of the way spent walking in the footsteps of Jesus. Love that binds us together, both here around this rail at the Eucharist, and as we are then strengthened and sent out into the world as beloved disciples of Jesus.

The love of God doesn’t just settle over us, but calls us to action—God calls us to partnership, not passivity; God calls us to be fertile ground for God’s ongoing work in the world. Through God’s love, we are called to be healers, reconcilers, restorers, witnesses. In short: disciples. God knows us—and calls us to be partners in the restoration of creation. That’s a miracle, too.

It’s also a challenge. Every day we get met with a new crisis, a new outrage, a new attempt to separate and divide, and we all know that the object of division is to conquer, and let the spreading gloom steal away our hope. Yet it is in that moment that the real work can begin. It is when we fear we have lost our path that the need for a new one can guide us home. In the words of the poet Wendell Berry:

It may be that when we no longer know what to do,
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.

The gift of God’s grace, healing, and love comes to us in times of both joy and anxiety, and we too, like those Magi, are dazzled, amazed, changed. What gifts can we offer in return? Perhaps we can renew our commitment to walk this journey of faith together, to offer God and each other the best we have to offer of ourselves.

The life of discipleship, of following Jesus, leads us like the Wise Men, those Magi, leads us on a different journey than we would have had had we just closed our eyes to that light, to the possibility of a dream of a better way home. It changes us, shapes us, reconciles us. The life of discipleship also calls us to bring forth our gifts and lay them at the feet of Christ, so that we can then embody his light ourselves and reflect it into the world that so desperately needs it. We just need to be ready and willing to follow that light wherever it leads us. And go home by another way—the way of ourselves embodying God’s love.


Preached at the 505 on January 5, and at 8:00 and 10:15 am on January 6 at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville.

Readings:
Isaiah 60:1-6
Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14
Ephesians 3:1-12
Matthew 2:1-10

Prayer, day 2170: The Feast of the Epiphany

We turn our eyes to the rising Light of Christ,
that we may be guided into wisdom and truth.
Lord, we give you thanks
for being our home
throughout all our wandering ways.

Wonderful Counselor,
may our eyes and hearts be opened
to receive your truth,
your grace,
and your peace.
May we kneel before you in joy and hope,
O Prince of Peace,
offering you all that we have
and are
and hope to be.

May we carry the good news of salvation, Lord Christ,
and be filled with rejoicing
throughout all the lands and nations.

Guided by the Holy Spirit,
may justice and peace kiss,
and may we join hands in unity,
faithfulness,
and steadfast love.

Holy One, we offer you the prayers of those we love,
and ask that you bless and comfort them as we pray.

Amen.