SOUL SURMISE

THE MERCY NOW PRAYER

Mary Gauthier sang in Fitzroy on Saturday night. The morning after I used her song Mercy Now in our Fitzroy Prayers. 

I had used a favourite pastoral passage the day before Mary’s gig, at a funeral service. Hebrews 4: 14 & 15 tells us that God doesn’t live way out in space but, through Jesus’ incarnation, understands all that we are going through. 

As a result of the work of Christ’s incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension Hebrews (4:16) goes on: -

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Our confidence comes through Christ’s work. The veil has been torn in two. Humans can now enter God’s presence with confidence.

So, I then used these verses of Mary Gauthier’s Mercy Now to lead us into silences when the congregation could bring people on their mind to the throne of grace to find mercy and grace.

 

My brother could use a little mercy now

He’s a stranger to freedom

He’s shackled to his fears and doubts

The pain that he lives in is

Almost more than living will allow

I love my brother, and he could use some mercy now

 

Bring members of your family to the throne of grace… to find mercy now…

 

My Church and my Country could use a little mercy now

As they sink into a poisoned pit

That’s going to take forever to climb out

They carry the weight of the faithful

Who follow ‘em down

I love my Church and Country and they could use some mercy now

 

Bring your church and country to the throne of grace… to find mercy now…

 

Every living thing could use a little mercy now

Only the hand of grace can end the race

Towards another mushroom cloud

People in power, well

They’ll do anything to keep their crown

I love life, and life itself could use some mercy now

 

Bring the life around you to the throne of grace… to find mercy now…

 

Yea, we all could use a little mercy now

I know we don’t deserve it

But we need it anyhow

We hang in the balance

Dangle ‘tween hell and hallowed ground

Every single one of us could use some mercy now

Every single one of us could use some mercy now

 

Bring yourself to the throne of grace… to find mercy now…

Lord, answer our prayers. May those we have brought before you know that in anything and everything this week, they can approach your throne of grace with confidence. May they experience your mercy.

In Jesus name… Amen

THE GOD WITH US PRAYER

photo: Mark Dyde

 

LORD, enlighten the eyes of our hearts

That we may we see

Emmanuel

God with us

 

In the joy of family together

And in the sadness of empty chairs.

May we know God with us 

 

In the blessing of our grace nourished souls

And in the sins and doubts within us.

May we know God with us

 

In the abundance of what we are given

And in the poverty of so much around us. 

May we know God with us

 

In our city blessed with peace and hope

And in a world that is still at war.

Emmanuel - God with us

 

Lord,

In our wedding feasts

In our hospital wards

In our homeless streets

In our divided society

In Onialeku, Dehredun, Isle of Dogs, Natal or Lebanon

In our new class rooms and lecture theatres

In our vocations

In our vacations

In our clubs, societies and cafes

In our homes 

 

Lord,

Wherever we are

Whoever we are with

However we feel

Whatever ways we are broken

Even in the situations that cannot be fixed

Emmanuel - God with us!

EMMANUEL - GOD WITH US

Emmanuel is not just a word for Christmas. The truth of its meaning "God with us" needs to be heard all year round. 

I am looking back on this poem/reflection from Christmas 2017 and thinking that it has to have been in influenced by a Sam Wells Talk at the BMS Catalyst Live Conference in 2016. 

Little did I know that in 2019 I would be using three of Wells' books to unpack his missional theology of "Being With" in a Sermon Series. 

As that Series begins in Fitzroy this Sunday (8/9/19) I thought I would reblog the poem/reflection. 

It is good to hear Emmanuel a few months before Advent!

 

Emmanuel - God With Us

 

May we know God with us

 

In the joy of family together

And in the sadness of empty chairs.

May we know God with us 

 

In the blessing of our grace nourished souls

And in the sins and doubts within us.

May we know God with us

 

In the abundance of what we are given

And in the poverty of so much around us. 

May we know God with us

 

In our city blessed with peace and hope

And in a world that is still at war.

Emmanuel - God with us

 

Wherever we are

Whoever we are with

However we feel

Whatever ways we are broken

Even in the situations that cannot be fixed

Emmanuel - God with us!

SERVICES OF WORSHIP MAKES SERVICE OUR WORSHIP

Our God we give you thanks

That we can come to our service of worship

We remember our brothers and sisters

In other parts of our world

Who are meeting in secret

Or even those who are meeting in public 

But with security on their doors

For fear of terrorist attack or religious persecution

God we are grateful for the freedom from fear that we have

As we gather today

We thank you to for all the resources we have

To help us in corporate worship

The musicians, the prayers, the Scripture readers, the preachers

Who lead us week by week

We thank you for this weekly discipline

That you have called us to

Of gathering together as community

To remember our place in your design 

Creatures before the Creator

Children in the arms of our father

Servants in the service of our Lord

We thank you for the space for this weekly habit

Forgive us when we misuse it

When we come and sing and pray and listen

And then when the music fades

Our souls get lost in the clamour

The clutter and the concerns of the week ahead

Lord as you forgive us, purify us

Send your Spirit that our liturgy of worship

Might spiritually renew us, refresh us and realign us

Lord may we see this weekly worship time

Not as a Sunday morning cul-de-sac

But as a highway into the week ahead

As the apostle Paul urged us

May we offer our bodies as living sacrifices

Holy and pleasing to you

May that be our spiritual worship

Not being conformed to the pattern of the world

But transformed by the renewing of our minds

To send us into our everyday lives

To make every connection accidental or diary scheduled

An act of worship

Lord, imitation is the highest form of worship

So may we be like you in every engagement

In our homes

On our streets

In our places of work

And of leisure

Across our city

Even reaching beyond, to our enemies

Lord by your Spirit, 

May we find in our times of worship

The energy of resilience and imagination

So that we might live the lives that you require

To act justly 

To love mercy 

And to walk humbly with your God

God, may this service of worship

Make service our worship in the week ahead.

AMEN

IN A WEEK LIKE THIS (MY RESPONSE TO THE OMAGH BOMB)

21 years ago today my country was in shock as news of the Omagh bomb broke.  It was a Saturday afternoon when the Real IRA, who opposed the IRA ceasefire, set off a bomb in Omagh town centre. Everyone thought of who they knew that might be caught up in it. In the end 29 were callously murdered.

It was my turn to do a Thought For The Day on BBC Radio Ulster six days later. This was my prayer as I reflected on the week that we had grieved through.

 

Lord, we come to the end of another week
Except it hasn't been just another week
It has been the worst week of our lives
And even worse for some
Lord help us to be honest, vulnerable and somehow hopeful in the reflection of our feelings

Lord we have been shocked
Shocked by how one tiny second can tear our lives apart
Shocked by how far humanity can fall
Shocked by how callous and painful mankind's actions can stoop

Lord, we are grieving
Grieving for the loss of lives with so much love and energy still to give
Grieving for the man and woman and child who we will never be able to hold again
Grieving for our history that is as sad and twisted as this

Lord we are confused
Confused at why this should happen
Confused about how this should happen to the innocent
Confused about where you and faith enter into these events

Lord we have been angry
Angry at why we allowed our family and friends to go shopping
Angry at how evil people could rip our world asunder
Angry that you allowed it to happen

Lord we are seeking
Seeking some kind of feeble consolation in the midst of our deluge of tears
Seeking some kind of hope that good might come from this evil
Seeking your Spirit whom Jesus called a Comforter to whisper into our maddening silence

Lord we are squinting for faith
Faith that the majority might have some kind of a say in the future
Faith that love will end our hate, good will end our evil and grace will touch our broken hearts
Faith in a God who is as angry as we are and who is reaching out his hand to us.

Lord we are remembering
Remembering those who today can no longer be shocked, grieve, be angry, be confused, seek or squint for faith
Remembering that you watched as your son covered in blood, died at the futile whim of injustice
Remembering that that very death is the only thing that we can grope in the dark for in a week like this.

Lord we have planted our loved ones deep in the bloody earth of Ireland this week
We have watered them with our tears
Lord may you allow them to be seeds of a love that will grow into our peace.

Lord remember us. 

WHEN A WIND COMES OUT OF NOWHERE...

We have many little hiccups leading up to our 2019 Fitzroy team to Uganda. When we boarded in Dublin for Addis Ababa and the connecting flight to Entebbe, I uttered the famous last words, "Nothing to think about now for 10 hours..." The flight was to touch down briefly in Madrid but a storm sent us off to spend a few very dull hours on the runway in Barcelona before flying back to Madrid. We were now 8 hours overdue and missing our Entebbe connection. This is my sobering meditation on such a day...

 

You can have your destination planned

And know exactly how you are getting there

Dates and times all on your ticket

“Nothing more to think about until you arrive”

Famous last words

Like certainty, 

Or ‘nothing can go wrong’

And “we have it under control”.

 

“Sometimes a wind comes out of nowhere

And knocks you off your feet”

As Bruce Cockburn sings it

It can send you off course

Divert you to somewhere off your map

Towards worry

Anger

Frustration 

And weariness.

 

That wind and where it blows you

Cannot be eradicated

Or erased

God will not shift the weather patterns of the world

For your own self indulgence

Life is not the wind that blows

But how we respond when it does.

 

“Worry,” said the Master

“Adds nothing to your circumstances but worry”

“Surmise,” he went on,

“The Uganda Cranes as the fly

Or the sunflowers as the decorate a field

No toiling or spinning

But utterly beautiful.”

“Trust,” he teaches

“Brings a peace beyond understanding”

 

The breeze of the Spirit

Where it blows, no one knows

And so it is with all of those born of the Spirit of God 

Certainty gives way

To faith

And faith was the lesson of today.

GO, BE GRACE

(written for a post communion sending liturgy, in Fitzroy) 

 

Go, be grace

In a graceless world

Be grace to those whose labels

Exile them from belonging

Be grace to those whose failures

Have them losers in the winners’ enclosure

Be grace to those pushed and pulled by Empire

Until they lost the grace within themselves

Be grace to those who don’t think like you

They are not bad people, just wrong

(Or maybe we are!)

Be grace to those who have hurt you

Love them, pray for them, bless them

Go, be grace

In a graceless world!

 

Go, be grace

Like Jesus

Who humbled himself

Became meek

Who mourned focus

And hungered and thirsted for justice for all

Go, be grace

Like a loser

Cursed on a tree

Dying to power

Then rising, to be grace

From the right hand of the throne of mercy

As God gifted us a lavish and ridiculous grace

Go, be grace

In a graceless world.

SHIFT THE FOCUS

LORD SHIFT OUR FOCUS

From your own efforts to gather more

To the birds who have enough

From your own attempts to look good

To the roses in their springtime magnificence

 

LORD SHIFT OUR FOCUS

From the feeble efforts to change who we are

To opening up to what God’s grace longs to make us

From waiting until we are good enough for God

To having his strength made perfect in our weakness

 

LORD SHIFT OUR FOCUS

From the selfishness of being stuck in a moment

To the usefulness of living for the eternal

From the slavery of the things that we see

To the freedom of living in the Spirit unseen

 

LORD SHIFT OUR FOCUS

From the love we are craving to get

To the mercy we are zealous to give

From a holiness that feeds our self righteousness

To a Godliness that feeds the world

LORD SHIFT OUR FOCUS.

 

MATTHEW 6: 30-34

 “If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

 “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.

 

THE ANNE LAMOTT KNOWING LITURGY

"I live for Sundays. It's like going to the spiritual gas station to fill up on fuel and clean the dirty windshield and mirrors. I usually show up nuts, self obsessed and vaguely agitated and I am at once reminded not of who I am but whose I am."

                     - Anne Lamott

"My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.  My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all^[c]; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand."

                    - John 10: 27-29

 

Come, in your going nuts

Come, in your self obsession

Come, in your vague agitation

Come and be known

Come and be open to be known

Come and hide nothing

Come and beg to be exposed

Come and be known

Come to be deeply known

Come, so as to be known into healing

Come, so as to be known into purity of who you are

Come, so as to be known into the totality of love

Come to the covenant

Come to the promise

Come to the sacrament

Come to the Good Shepherd, who laid down his life for the sheep.

 

Go, as the known, to know

Go, as the known, to bring others to be known

Go, as the known,

To seek the unknown who run, hide, deny, compensate, self harm

Go, as the known, to know.

 

 

BARBARA DASS'S PRAYER on FITZROY'S BBC RADIO ULSTER MORNING SERVICE

READING: Isaiah 33:7-9 (NIV)

Look, their brave men cry aloud in the streets;

    the envoys of peace weep bitterly.

 

The highways are deserted,

    no travelers are on the roads.

The treaty is broken,

    its witnesses are despised,

    no one is respected.

 

The land dries up and wastes away,

    Lebanon is ashamed and withers;

Sharon is like the Arabah,

    and Bashan and Carmel drop their leaves.

 

PRAYER

 

Sovereign LORD!

 

You handcrafted our beloved Ireland - the land we walk and breathe in.

You sculpted its mountains, cliffs and drumlins.

You carved the courses of its springs and rivers.

You clothed the land in its flora and fauna.

You were here in Ireland when your Son walked to the Cross.

Your face was upon us…your attentiveness never waning.

A Mother Hen gathering us under your outstretched wings,

Determined to save us all!

 

Praise God Almighty!

 

Look!

 

Listen!

 

Women clothed in mourning;

Tough men weep openly,

Peace-making diplomats in bitter tears,

Belfast’s a ghost town,

Not a soul in its entries or doorways.

 

Lord have mercy!

 

The peace treaty is broken.

Its conditions violated.

Its signers reviled.

 

Christ have mercy!

 

The very ground under our feet mourns;

The Belfast Hills hang their heads,

The Western Bog Meadows polluted and clogged,

The Eastern Greenways weed-choked,

The Belvoir Forest bare-branched.

 

Lord have mercy!

 

Heal our brokenness,

Cure our blindness,

Open our minds and hearts to you Lord!

 

Christ have mercy!

 

Create a readiness in our hearts,

So that our ears may hear and understand,

So that our eyes may see and perceive,

The resounding presence of Christ’s Kingdom of Shalom in our land!

 

Shalom walked into every alleyway and street.

Shalom declared in the corners and courtyards.

Shalom played in the parks and parklands.

Shalom stepped over thresholds into homes.

Shalom danced on the hilltops.

 

May it be so! It will be so!

It is so now!

Praise the Lord!

 

Amen!