I found a treasure online that I want to share with you on this day of Epiphany. Here is a sound recording of T.S. Eliot reading his poem “Journey of the Magi.” The words to the poem are printed on the page as well, but I recommend listening to it with your eyes closed. I…
This coming Sunday we will have a guest speaker, Stefan Warner, talking about his experiences with Christian Peacemaker Teams in Iraq. Here’s our call to worship: As we gather this morning, let us proclaim: We are people of God’s peace, Seeking the path of Christ. We are people of God’s peace, Longing to live in…
It’s been awhile since I participated in this wonderful exercise. Thanks to Sally for posting this one. Blessings from 2011 (Yes, I know I have six for the Friday 5–that’s just the kind of rebel I am) A diagnosis—After years of struggles and frustrations, our 14-year-old son was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. The diagnosis does…
As we prepare to celebrate New Year’s Day this coming Sunday, I am re-posting a New Year’s prayer that I wrote last year. I have formatted the prayer to be read responsively-leader speaks the plain text, congregation the bold, and everyone speaks the bold italics. As always, you are welcome to use this prayer in…
I pray you all had a blessed Christmas day, and that you continue to celebrate Jesus with joy! For Christmas, my husband gave me the domain name “spaciousfaith.com”–and he did all the legwork to connect it to my blog. I realize that this is not particularly exciting for most folks, but I get a kick…
I’m hoping to take the week off between Christmas and New Year’s day, which means I’m doing a lot of worship planning this week. Our opening scripture for New Year’s day will be Ecclesiastes 3: 1, 11-14a. And here is the call to worship: Praise be to God, Creator of time and space! Who has…
Our time of worship together on Christmas day will be primarily a Christmas hymn sing. On top of the inherent busyness of this time of year, there’s been illness at my house this week. So the less preparation needed for worship, the better. Here’s the call to worship for Christmas Day: Hear the Good News:…
Here is the order of worship for our Christmas Eve service this year. This is basically a “Lessons and Carols” service–though not with all of the traditional readings. We will be using a variety of translations for the scripture readings, because sometimes you just need to hear King James English. (And sometimes you don’t.) Christmas…
The following reflection on Luke’s story of the annunciation (Luke 1:26-38) is adapted from a sermon I preached on December 13, 2009. You might have noticed by now that the writer of Luke gives us a lot of detail here in the first chapter. We know who was king. We know what priestly division Zechariah…
Last Thursday I was preparing for today’s service of communion and anointing. I pulled out the little bowl—hand-formed and glazed a brilliant blue—that we use for anointing oil. To my surprise, the bowl still contained ashes from Holy Week. So there I was in mid-December, trying to pour the ashes on our lily plants and…
Spacious Faith 