Poetry and Prayer—Day 6: March 3

Written by: Julia Smolucha

When I Consider How My Light Is Spent by John Milton

God: consider us. Hold us this day. Bend our soul toward you, this day and the rest. As sun rises, make us of use. And stand sentinel over our day and night. Amen.

Click here for “Walk with Us in Lent” Lenten Calendar

Certain Semi-Sacred Symbols of the Season, I: Evergreen

November 28, 2021

He came down to a manger and went up to a cross and spent every day between with the al-most lifeless—the least, the last, the lost, the lame, the leper, and the loser. At Golgotha, they tried to throttle his eccentric, threatening message, but that irrepressible message of hope will not be stifled, and he comes back to show the world that death can never have the last word in God’s good world. Think of all that every time you see a Christmas tree this season of the year. Jesus Sempervirens, The Christ Evergreen.

The (Re)Birth of the Church, XI: Stewardship

November 21, 2021

The 80/80 congregation isn’t about counting the dollars; it’s an attitude it’s an attitude which says, if something needs to get done, I’ll do it. 80/80 congregations are like that baby Christian Church in Jerusalem I read about a moment ago from Acts. Luke tells us that there was not a needy person among them because those that had shared and those that lacked received.

The (Re)Birth of the Church, X: Generosity

November 14, 2021

This morning I want to think of generosity in a more expansive sense. I want us to be generous in our definition of generosity. I’d like to suggest that we be generous not just with what we give, but also with what we think. I want us to be generous—that is to say, expansive, spacious, giving, indiscriminate—in seeing the other not as profane but as sacred. What God has called clean, we must not call profane.

Poetry and Prayer—Day 6: March 3