growing grace farm
gardening + spirituality + homesteading + creation care
contemplative worship: pray your prayer
Elements from today’s Sanctuary service at Skyland UMC:
Opening Meditation:
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.
- What does your human journey, your ordinary life, look like? What activities are included?
- What does your spiritual journey, the well-formed life, look like? What activities are included?
- Do those two journeys look the same for you? Do they overlap? Are they separate? Are they one and the same?
- Substitute the word “prayer” for “life.” How are you living your prayer? Does that take on a new meaning for you?
How do we live our prayer as spiritual beings?
- Be compassionate to all you meet–everyone is struggling with some sort of issue
- See the God-within–we all carry darkness and light within our souls. Look for the gifts and graces that God celebrates in each of us
- Live as a humble witness and servant–this is where the spiritual being moves beyond the human journey; we put our egos aside and go to the One within, living out the light and love that is so unconditionally shared with us by the Beloved
- Be quiet and at peace with God–reconnect, listen, seek, surrender
Become a living prayer
Music for meditation after message: Living Prayer written by Ron Block, performed by Alison Krauss
Closing prayer after communion:
Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world.
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands with which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours.
~Teresa of Ávila
I wanted this. Thank you😊❤️
Gladly!