Before the marvel of this night, adoring fold your wings and bow,then tear the sky apart with light and with your news the world endow.
Proclaim the birth of Christ and peace, that fear and death and sorrow cease. Sing peace, sing peace, sing gift of peace, sing peace, sing gift of peace.
Awake the sleeping world with song, this is the day the Lord has made, assemble here, celestial throng, in royal splendor come arrayed.
Give earth a glimpse of heavenly bliss, a teasing taste of what they miss. Sing bliss, sing bliss, sing endless bliss, sing bliss, sing endless bliss.
The love that we have always known, our constant joy and endless light, now to the love-less world be shown, now break upon its deathly night.
Into one song compress the love that rules our universe above: Sing love, sing love, sing God is love, sing love, sing God is love.
~Before the Marvel of This Night, WOV 636
I am ready for the gift of peace, for endless bliss, and God's love. Bring your love to this love-less world, tear the sky apart with your light, and proclaim the new day of peace where death and sorrow cease. I await your coming with a sense of urgency like no other. Come Lord Jesus.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Advent Prayer
I don't know who Margaret Anne Huffman is, but I love this prayer! Especially after seeing Matthew Robert Eippert yesterday, just hours after he was born!
Into the bleakest winters of our souls, Lord, you are tiptoeing on tiny Infant feet to find us and hold our hands. May we drop whatever it is we are so busy about these days to accept this gesture so small that it may get overlooked in our frantic search for something massive and overwhelming. Remind us that it is not you who demands large, lavish celebrations and enormous strobe-lit displays of faith. Rather, you ask only that we have the faith of a mustard seed and the willingness to let a small hand take ours. We are ready. Amen.
~~Margaret Anne Huffman
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Free Food!
Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters;
and you that have no money,come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.
Incline your ear, and come to me;
listen, so that you may live.
Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake their way,and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them,
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
Isaiah 55:1-3, 6-12
This passage really touched me today. It is full of the beauty and mystery of God, and full of grace. I really love the part about buying wine and milk without price. Especially when I hear of more people losing their jobs, the stock market being down, and the generally bad economic news that is so common these days.
It is a good reminder that God's love is free.
God's love and God's word are wonderful gifts to us. Gifts that, according to God, won't be wasted. God's word won't return empty, but will accomplish what it is meant to, just as the WORD (Jesus) accomplished what he was meant to do- to bring us to God by becoming human, living, dying, and living again.
If you are thirsty, come to the waters of God's word. Remember the waters of your baptism. If you are bankrupt, financially or spiritually, may these words fill you up with hope, joy and peace. God's thoughts are not our thoughts, and God's ways are not our ways. Thanks be to God for that.
May you see God's riches and blessings in your life today.
and you that have no money,come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.
Incline your ear, and come to me;
listen, so that you may live.
Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake their way,and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them,
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
Isaiah 55:1-3, 6-12
This passage really touched me today. It is full of the beauty and mystery of God, and full of grace. I really love the part about buying wine and milk without price. Especially when I hear of more people losing their jobs, the stock market being down, and the generally bad economic news that is so common these days.
It is a good reminder that God's love is free.
God's love and God's word are wonderful gifts to us. Gifts that, according to God, won't be wasted. God's word won't return empty, but will accomplish what it is meant to, just as the WORD (Jesus) accomplished what he was meant to do- to bring us to God by becoming human, living, dying, and living again.
If you are thirsty, come to the waters of God's word. Remember the waters of your baptism. If you are bankrupt, financially or spiritually, may these words fill you up with hope, joy and peace. God's thoughts are not our thoughts, and God's ways are not our ways. Thanks be to God for that.
May you see God's riches and blessings in your life today.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Preparing the way
The branches outside my window are bowed down with snow. Beautiful, clean, white snow. I love to see it on the trees. On the road, it's another story!
Slipping and sliding, long commutes, taking careful steps as we walk on the sidewalk. It's that time again. The last couple of mornings I've been woken by the snow plows and snow blowers, clearing the roads and the sidewalks so that I can get out and about.
The snow makes Christmas seem even closer. We've entered the season of Advent and our theme at Grace is "preparing the way." As the snow is cleared off the road and my usual decorations are cleared to make way for my Christmas decorations, I am thinking about how I am going to clear out my heart this year so that Jesus can have the best spot, with the least clutter.
What are the "slippery" spots in my life? What are the things that "jam it up" so that God isn't able to get through? These are things I will be thinking and praying about today. I hope you will join me in preparing the way for Jesus today and in the days to come.
Slipping and sliding, long commutes, taking careful steps as we walk on the sidewalk. It's that time again. The last couple of mornings I've been woken by the snow plows and snow blowers, clearing the roads and the sidewalks so that I can get out and about.
The snow makes Christmas seem even closer. We've entered the season of Advent and our theme at Grace is "preparing the way." As the snow is cleared off the road and my usual decorations are cleared to make way for my Christmas decorations, I am thinking about how I am going to clear out my heart this year so that Jesus can have the best spot, with the least clutter.
What are the "slippery" spots in my life? What are the things that "jam it up" so that God isn't able to get through? These are things I will be thinking and praying about today. I hope you will join me in preparing the way for Jesus today and in the days to come.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
The Alphabet of Grace
"You wake up out of the huge crevasses of the night and your dreaming. You get out of bed, wash and dress, eat breakfast, say goodbye and go away never maybe to return for all you know, to work, talk, lust, pray, dawdle and do, and at the end of the day, if your luck holds, you come home again, home again. Then night again. Bed. The little death of sleep, sleep of death. Morning, afternoon, evening- the hours of the day, of any day, of your day and my day. The alphabet of grace. If there is a God who speaks anywhere, surely he speaks here: through waking up and working, through going away and coming back again, through people you read and books you meet, through falling asleep in the dark."
The Alphabet of Grace, Frederick Buechner.
God is hard to understand. Impossible, actually. God doesn't work the way we want. God doesn't make sense. We wonder what God is up to most of the time. How does God listen to all our prayers? How does God love us so much even when we are terrible? What is God really like?
But the alphabet of grace is simple. The way God comes to us is through ordinary things. Bread. Wine. Water. Words. Flesh.
God uses simple things to communicate with us.
Life can seem boring and repetitive. Where is God in all this? God is there in the simple things. Rest. Quiet. Chance conversations or encounters with friends and strangers. God uses the rythyms of life to bring us Grace. How has God brought your Grace in the ordinary things today?
The Alphabet of Grace, Frederick Buechner.
God is hard to understand. Impossible, actually. God doesn't work the way we want. God doesn't make sense. We wonder what God is up to most of the time. How does God listen to all our prayers? How does God love us so much even when we are terrible? What is God really like?
But the alphabet of grace is simple. The way God comes to us is through ordinary things. Bread. Wine. Water. Words. Flesh.
God uses simple things to communicate with us.
Life can seem boring and repetitive. Where is God in all this? God is there in the simple things. Rest. Quiet. Chance conversations or encounters with friends and strangers. God uses the rythyms of life to bring us Grace. How has God brought your Grace in the ordinary things today?
Monday, November 3, 2008
College Tour
Good Monday Morning to you!
What a beautiful day it is. I can't even say how thankful I am that it is November 3 and the temps will be in the 70s! I am soaking up the warmth, sunshine and colorful leaves, cuz all those things are fading fast.
Last week I, along with a couple of other pastors, took 15 high school students on a tour of ELCA colleges. It was wonderful. The kids were all great as were the schools. It was interesting to see the similarities (good education, caring professors, faith based learning, high value placed on community) and differences of each school. It was also really fun to see the students come alive at various campuses. Each one has a different feel, and it is so important that you can "see" yourself at that school. That is how I felt when I first visited Luther College (www.luther.edu) in Decorah, Iowa. I loved it immediately and couldn't wait for high school to be over from that point on. I cherised every visit back there over my senior year. And being back there last week, I still had that same feeling.
Another interesting thing was how the students attitudes changed toward the schools as we visited them. In the beginning, they were all pretty resistent to going to school "in the middle of nowhere" or "in the middle of a cornfield." But when they got on campus, you couldn't say that the colleges were boring at all. There is so much going on- concerts, parties, groups, sports, worship, speakers...you name it!
Also, one of the benefits of going to a private school is that you have a much higher chance of finishing in 4 years as opposed to 5 or more. There are also tons of scholarships available.
But, like I said, it's all where you can see yourself. I hope that if you know someone who is considering college, you'll encourage them to just visit an ELCA school. They are great ministries of our church.
What a beautiful day it is. I can't even say how thankful I am that it is November 3 and the temps will be in the 70s! I am soaking up the warmth, sunshine and colorful leaves, cuz all those things are fading fast.
Last week I, along with a couple of other pastors, took 15 high school students on a tour of ELCA colleges. It was wonderful. The kids were all great as were the schools. It was interesting to see the similarities (good education, caring professors, faith based learning, high value placed on community) and differences of each school. It was also really fun to see the students come alive at various campuses. Each one has a different feel, and it is so important that you can "see" yourself at that school. That is how I felt when I first visited Luther College (www.luther.edu) in Decorah, Iowa. I loved it immediately and couldn't wait for high school to be over from that point on. I cherised every visit back there over my senior year. And being back there last week, I still had that same feeling.
Another interesting thing was how the students attitudes changed toward the schools as we visited them. In the beginning, they were all pretty resistent to going to school "in the middle of nowhere" or "in the middle of a cornfield." But when they got on campus, you couldn't say that the colleges were boring at all. There is so much going on- concerts, parties, groups, sports, worship, speakers...you name it!
Also, one of the benefits of going to a private school is that you have a much higher chance of finishing in 4 years as opposed to 5 or more. There are also tons of scholarships available.
But, like I said, it's all where you can see yourself. I hope that if you know someone who is considering college, you'll encourage them to just visit an ELCA school. They are great ministries of our church.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Night Prayer
I found this prayer on a blog I go to for clergy. It is a good reminder for all of us to let things go at the end of the day. We are promised a new start, a fresh start each morning. We are made new each day by God through our baptism. We do not have to be perfect, we just have to belong to God and trust in God's grace and love.
I hope you will pray this tonight and let God's peace surround you and renew you as you sleep.
it is night.
The night is for stillness.
Let us be still in the presence of God.
It is night after a long day.
What has been done has been done;
what has not been done has not been done;
let it be.
The night is dark;
Let our fears of the darkness of the world and our own lives rest in you.
The night is quiet.
Let the quietness of your peace enfold us,
all dear to us,
and all who have no peace.
The night heralds the dawn.
Let us look expectantly to a new day,
new joys,
new possibilities.
In your name we pray.
Amen.
I hope you will pray this tonight and let God's peace surround you and renew you as you sleep.
Night Prayer (source The New Zealand Prayer Book)
Lord,it is night.
The night is for stillness.
Let us be still in the presence of God.
It is night after a long day.
What has been done has been done;
what has not been done has not been done;
let it be.
The night is dark;
Let our fears of the darkness of the world and our own lives rest in you.
The night is quiet.
Let the quietness of your peace enfold us,
all dear to us,
and all who have no peace.
The night heralds the dawn.
Let us look expectantly to a new day,
new joys,
new possibilities.
In your name we pray.
Amen.
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