Opening Sentences, Collects, and Blessings for Morning Prayer
If you are wanting to pray morning prayer, here are the rotating parts. You can find morning prayer here.
From the 2019 Book of Common Prayer (Anglican Church in North America)
OPENING SENTENCES OF SCRIPTURE
ADVENT
In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
ISAIAH 40:3
CHRISTMAS
Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
LUKE 2:10-11
EPIPHANY
From the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts.
MALACHI 1:11
LENT and OTHER PENITENTIAL OCCASIONS
Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
MATTHEW 3:2
Turn your face from my sins, and blot out all my misdeeds.
PSALM 51:9
If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
MARK 8:34
HOLY WEEK
Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which was brought upon me, which the Lord inflicted on the day of his fierce anger.
LAMENTATIONS 1:12
EASTER
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
COLOSSIANS 3:1
ASCENSION
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
HEBREWS 4:14, 16
PENTECOST
You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
ACTS 1:8
TRINITY SUNDAY
Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!
REVELATION 4:8
DAYS OF THANKSGIVING
Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce; then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will be bursting with wine.
PROVERBS 3:9-10
AT ANY TIME
The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.
HABAKKUK 2:20
O send out your light and your truth, that they may lead me, and bring me to your holy hill, and to your dwelling.
PSALM 43:3
Thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.”
ISAIAH 57:15
The hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.
JOHN 4:23
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
PHILIPPIANS 1:2
or this
I was glad when they said unto me, “We will go into the house of the Lord.”
PSALM 122:1
or this
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be always acceptable in your sight, O Lord
, my rock and my redeemer.
PSALM 19:14
THE COLLECT OF THE DAY
From the Collects of the Christian Year
A COLLECT FOR STRENGTH TO AWAIT CHRIST’S RETURN
Sunday
O God our King, by the resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ on the first day of the week, you conquered sin, put death to flight, and gave us the hope of everlasting life: Redeem all our days by this victory; forgive our sins, banish our fears, make us bold to praise you and to do your will; and steel us to wait for the consummation of your kingdom on the last great Day; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR THE RENEWAL OF LIFE
Monday
O God, the King eternal, whose light divides the day from the night and turns the shadow of death into the morning: Drive far from us all wrong desires, incline our hearts to keep your law, and guide our feet into the way of peace; that, having done your will with cheerfulness during the day, we may, when night comes, rejoice to give you thanks; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR PEACE
Tuesday
O God, the author of peace and lover of concord, to know you is eternal life and to serve you is perfect freedom: Defend us, your humble servants, in all assaults of our enemies; that we, surely trusting in your defense, may not fear the power of any adversaries, through the might of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR GRACE
Wednesday
O Lord, our heavenly Father, almighty and everlasting God, you have brought us safely to the beginning of this day: Defend us by your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin nor run into any danger; and that, guided by your Spirit, we may do what is righteous in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR GUIDANCE
Thursday
Heavenly Father, in you we live and move and have our being: We humbly pray you so to guide and govern us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget you, but may remember that we are ever walking in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR ENDURANCE
Friday
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the Cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.
A COLLECT FOR SABBATH REST
Saturday
Almighty God, who after the creation of the world rested from all your works and sanctified a day of rest for all your creatures: Grant that we, putting away all earthly anxieties, may be duly prepared for the service of your sanctuary, and that our rest here upon earth may be a preparation for the eternal rest promised to your people in heaven; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Unless the Great Litany or the Eucharist is to follow, one of the following prayers for mission is added. If the Great Litany is used, it follows here, or after a hymn or anthem, and concludes the Office.
PRAYER FOR MISSION
Almighty and everlasting God, who alone works great marvels: Send down upon our clergy and the congregations committed to their charge the life-giving Spirit of your grace, shower them with the continual dew of your blessing, and ignite in them a zealous love of your Gospel; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
or this
O God, you have made of one blood all the peoples of the earth, and sent your blessed Son to preach peace to those who are far off and to those who are near: Grant that people everywhere may seek after you and find you; bring the nations into your fold; pour out your Spirit upon all flesh; and hasten the coming of your kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
or this:
Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the Cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit thatwe, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
BLESSING
The Officiant says one of these concluding sentences (and the People may be invited to join)
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all evermore. Amen.
2 CORINTHIANS 13:14T
May the God of hope fill us with all joy and peace in believing through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
ROMANS 15:13T
Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine: Glory to him from generation to generation in the Church, and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever.Amen.
EPHESIANS 3:20-21T
Daily Morning Prayer
If you are wanting to pray morning prayer, here it is! It is easy to follow along here on your phone, tablet, or computer. The officiant (leader) prays the text in the normal print, and everyone else prays the text in the bold print. (Wherever you see *’s, you may either all say that part of the prayer together, or you may rotate, with one group of people saying the line with the *, and another group saying the next line, and so forth and so on.)
If you are leading prayer among a number of people or are doing this alone, you will have to click to another page a few times. (This is clearly marked).
If you are just participating with another person leading, everything you need is here!
I do recommend you have your Scriptures chosen before you start. You can use the ACNA Daily Office Lectionary or another one if you prefer. (Once you click this link, scroll down to the section called “Calendars and Lectionaries”.)
From the 2019 Book of Common Prayer (Anglican Church in North America)
OPENING SENTENCE
The Officiant may begin Morning Prayer by reading an opening sentence of Scripture. Click here for these Scriptures.
CONFESSION OF SIN
The Officiant says to the People:
Let us humbly confess our sins to Almighty God.
Silence is kept and then all say:
Almighty and most merciful Father,
we have erred and strayed from your ways like lost sheep.
We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts.
We have offended against your holy laws.
We have left undone those things which we ought to have done,
and we have done those things which we ought notto have done;
and apart from your grace, there is no health in us.
O Lord, have mercy upon us.
Spare all those who confess their faults.
Restore all those who are penitent, according to your promises declared to all people in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake,
that we may now live a godly, righteous, and sober life,
to the glory of your holy Name. Amen.
The Priest alone stands and says the Absolution.
The Almighty and merciful Lord grant you absolution and remission of all your sins, true repentance, amendment of life, and the grace and consolation of his Holy Spirit. Amen.
If there is no priest present, a deacon or layperson says the following:
Grant to your faithful people, merciful Lord, pardon and peace; that we may be cleansed from all our sins, and serve you with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
.
INVITATORY
Officiant and people engage in call and response.
Officiant O Lord, open our lips;
People And our mouth shall proclaim your praise.
Officiant O God, make speed to save us;
People O Lord, make haste to help us.
Officiant Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit;
People As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Officiant Praise the Lord.
People The Lord’s Name be praised.
INVITATORY SCRIPTURE
All will say either the Venite, Jubilate or Pascha Nostrum.
VENITE
(O Come)
O come, let us sing unto the Lord; *
let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving *
and show ourselves glad in him with psalms.
For the Lordis a great God *
and a great King above all gods.
In his hand are all the depths of the earth, *
and the heights of the hills are his also.
The sea is his, for he made it, *
and his hands prepared the dry land.
O come, let us worship and fall down, *
and kneel before the Lordour Maker.
For he is our God, *
and we are the people of his pasture,
and the sheep of his hand.
The following verses may be omitted, except in Lent.
Today, if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts *
as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness,
When your fathers tested me, *
and put me to the proof, though they had seen my works.
Forty years long was I grieved with this generation and said, *
“It is a people that err in their hearts, for they have not known my ways,”
Of whom I swore in my wrath *
that they should not enter into my rest.
PSALM 95:1-7, 8-11
JUBILATE
Be Joyful
O be joyful in the Lord, all you lands; *
serve the Lordwith gladness,
and come before his presence with a song.
Be assured that the Lord, he is God; *
it is he that has made us, and not we ourselves;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
O go your way into his gates with thanksgiving,
and into his courts with praise; *
be thankful unto him, and speak good of his Name.
For the Lordis gracious, his mercy is everlasting, *
and his truth endures from generation to generation.
PSALM 100
PASCHA NOSTRUM
Christ our Passover
Alleluia. Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us; *
therefore let us keep the feast,
Not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, *
but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Alleluia.
Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; *
death no longer has dominion over him.
The death that he died, he died to sin, once for all; *
but the life he lives, he lives to God.
So also consider yourselves dead to sin, *
and alive to God in Jesus Christ our Lord. Alleluia.
Christ has been raised from the dead, *
the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
For since by a man came death, *
by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.
For as in Adam all die, *
so also in Christ shall all be made alive. Alleluia.
1 CORINTHIANS 5:7-8; ROMANS 6:9-11; 1 CORINTHIANS 15:20-22
THE READINGS
It is common to follow a lectionary here (a list of set readings throughout the year). You can find ACNA’s lectionary here. ( Once you click this link, scroll down to the section called “Calendars and Lectionaries”.)
THE APPOINTED PSALMS
Psalm is read. At the end of the Psalms the Gloria Patri (Glory be to the Father…. (found below)) is said.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; *
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
THE LESSONS
One or more Lessons are read, the Reader first saying
A Reading from _____________.
After each lesson, the Reader may say:
The Word of the Lord.
People Thanks be to God.
THE CANTICLES
All may say one or more of the following Canticles after each reading or after all the readings. (Traditionally these are also sung.)
TE DEUM LAUDAMUS
We Praise You, O God
We praise you, O God; we acclaim you as Lord; *
all creation worships you, the Father everlasting.
To you all angels, all the powers of heaven, *
the cherubim and seraphim, sing in endless praise:
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of power and might, *
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
The glorious company of apostles praise you. *
The noble fellowship of prophets praise you.
The white-robed army of martyrs praise you. *
Throughout the world the holy Church acclaims you:
Father, of majesty unbounded,
your true and only Son, worthy of all praise, *
and the Holy Spirit, advocate and guide.
You, Christ, are the king of glory, *
the eternal Son of the Father.
When you took our flesh to set us free *
you humbly chose the Virgin’s womb.
You overcame the sting of death *
and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers.
You are seated at God’s right hand in glory. *
We believe that you will come to be our judge.
Come then, Lord, and help your people, *
bought with the price of your own blood,
and bring us with your saints *
to glory everlasting.
The following verses may be omitted
Save your people, Lord, and bless your inheritance;*
govern and uphold them now and always.
Day by day we bless you; *
we praise your Name for ever.
Keep us today, Lord, from all sin; *
have mercy on us, Lord, have mercy.
Lord, show us your love and mercy, *
for we have put our trust in you.
In you, Lord, is our hope; *
let us never be put to shame.
BENEDICTUS ES, DOMINE
A Song of Praise
Glory to you, Lord God of our fathers; *
you are worthy of praise; glory to you.
Glory to you for the radiance of your holy Name; *
we will praise you and highly exalt you for ever.
Glory to you in the splendor of your temple; *
on the throne of your majesty, glory to you.
Glory to you, seated between the Cherubim; *
we will praise you and highly exalt you for ever.
Glory to you, beholding the depths; *
in the high vault of heaven, glory to you.
Glory to you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; *
we will praise you and highly exalt you for ever.
SONG OF THE THREE YOUNG MEN, 29-34
BENEDICTUS
The Song of Zechariah
Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; *
he has come to his people and set them free.
He has raised up for us a mighty savior, *
born of the house of his servant David.
Through his holy prophets he promised of old
that he would save us from our enemies, *
from the hands of all who hate us.
He promised to show mercy to our fathers *
and to remember his holy covenant.
This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham, *
to set us free from the hands of our enemies,
Free to worship him without fear, *
holy and righteous in his sight
all the days of our life.
You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, *
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way,
To give his people knowledge of salvation *
by the forgiveness of their sins.
In the tender compassion of our God *
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
To shine on those who dwell in darkness
and in the shadow of death, *
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; *
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
LUKE 1:68-79
THE APOSTLES’ CREED
Officiant and People all say together.
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.
THE PRAYERS
Officiant The Lord be with you.
People And with your spirit.
Officiant Let us pray.
Officiant Lord, have mercy.
People Christ, have mercy.
Officiant Lord, have mercy.
Officiant and People all say together:
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name,
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Officiant and People engage in the following call and response.
Officiant O Lord, show your mercy upon us;
People And grant us your salvation.
Officiant O Lord, guide those who govern us;
People And lead us in the way of justice and truth.
Officiant Clothe your ministers with righteousness;
People And let your people sing with joy.
Officiant O Lord, save your people;
People And bless your inheritance.
Officiant Give peace in our time, O Lord;
People And defend us by your mighty power.
Officiant Let not the needy, O Lord, be forgotten;
People Nor the hope of the poor be taken away.
Officiant Create in us clean hearts, O God;
People And take not your Holy Spirit from us.
THE COLLECTS AND THE PRAYER FOR MISSION
The Officiant then prays one or more Collects and the Prayer for Mission. These collects and prayers can be found here.
GENERAL INTERCESSIONS
All may offer up their individual petitions silently or aloud.
THE GENERAL THANKSGIVING
All say:
Almighty God, Father of all mercies,
we your unworthy servants give you humble thanks
for all your goodness and loving-kindness
to us and to all whom you have made.
We bless you for our creation, preservation,
and all the blessings of this life;
but above all for your immeasurable love
in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ;
for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory.
And, we pray, give us such an awareness of your mercies,
that with truly thankful hearts
we may show forth your praise,
not only with our lips, but in our lives,
by giving up our selves to your service,
and by walking before you
in holiness and righteousness all our days;
Through Jesus Christ our Lord,
to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit,
be honor and glory throughout all ages. Amen.
A PRAYER OF ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM
Officiant says: Almighty God, you have given us grace at this time, with one accord to make our common supplications to you; and you have promised through your well-beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his Name you will grant their requests: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting. Amen.
THE BLESSING
Officiant Let us bless the Lord.
People Thanks be to God.
From Easter Day through the Day of Pentecost, “Alleluia, alleluia” may be added to the preceding versicle and response.
The officiant says concluding blessing.
The blessings can be found here.
Tips and Resources for Praying the Daily Office
By Rev. Kristen Yates
In last week’s blog post, I introduced the practice of the Daily Office, a wonderful practice to deepen our prayer life and to connect us with others. If you missed that post, you can find it here.
In this week’s post, I would like to provide some tips and resources for engaging this practice. For while it is a helpful and formative practice, it can sometimes feel confusing or cumbersome for the newbie, and the result is that one can try it and quickly abandon it. So don’t do that!
Instead of jumping right into the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) - which contains the Daily Office - or trying to pray all the offices (Morning, Afternoon, Evening, and Compline Prayer) right away, I have some other suggestions.
If you are new to this practice, consider the following resources and suggestions:
Pray Daily Prayer. This is a helpful book that you can purchase here from Christ Church Plano. Pray Daily gives you a taste of the practice and is very easy to follow. The book is divided by the days of the week, and includes 4 times of praying each day. Each prayer pulls from the Book of Common Prayer but is much reduced and only takes about 5 minutes to pray. This is a great place to start, especially if one of your personal goals is to pray multiple times a day. (Also, they now have a Pray Daily for Families listed on this page at the top which might interest you.)
Use this online resource: http://dailyoffice2019.com. This is an online version of the Daily Office that automatically updates the readings and other parts of the Daily Office for you each day and for each office. You can even tailor it a bit; for example, you can choose how quickly you want to read through the Scriptures in a given year or two. You can also share your settings with others if you would like to pray this with others.
Pray the Daily Office Booklet by Anglican Pastor. Every few months, Anglican Pastor offers up a new booklet with all the prayers and Scripture readings for the coming seasons. If you are wanting a hard copy of the prayers and want a modified version that is easy to pray alone, this might just be for you. It will take you a few minutes to figure out out how everything fits together, but it is pretty simple to use. Sign up here to receive downloadable booklets you can print.
Pray with others. One of the best ways to learn this practice is to pray with others. So pray it with your spouse or in your Mission Community or with friends. Also consider joining Mission’s staff as we pray Morning Prayer every Tuesday at 10:15 AM in our church offices.
Pray an audio version of the Daily Office. If you are not able to pray it with others, a good way to “pray with others” is to engage an online audio version. Trinity Mission has a good version of this that is updated each day. (Do note: This version takes about 30-40 minutes each time.)
Don’t try to pray all four offices right away. Start with one and add others as you grow into this practice. For some of you, you will find that you will always just pray one of the offices; for others of you, praying all four will be an enriching experience.
Try some non-Anglican Daily Offices. There are numerous versions out there, but this has been my favorite througout the years: Celtic Daily Prayer (This is an online version but you can also order a book.)
Finally, if you have a copy of the BCP and are wanting to learn how to use it, come see me (Rev. Kristen). It’s take some time to get used to it since you have to flip back and forth between pages , but once you get it, you are good to go. Also, next week, I’ll post Morning and Evening Prayer for you on our blog and I’ll briefly describe the different sections of the prayers.
Spiritual Formation Blog Posts and Resources
At Mission Cincinnati, we blog almost every week on the topic of spiritual formation, discipleship, and soul-training exercises. This page will hold all the links to these posts in case you want to easily find them and re-read them. Enjoy!
You can find a link to this page on Mission’s Discipleship Page.
So here are the posts!
Rhythms of the Christian Life
Establishing Life-Giving Rhythms and Practices
Living Into the Christian Calendar
Learning a New Way to Pray: The Daily Office
Tips and Resources for Praying the Daily Office
Daily Office Prayers
Discipleship
Learning a New Way to Pray: The Daily Office
By the Rev. Kristen Yates
Over the last few weeks, we have been talking about the rhythmic nature of the Christian life. Last week, we talked about the formative nature of living into the Christian Calendar. This week, we want to explore the Daily Office. If you are new to the Anglican tradition, you may be unfamiliar with this spiritual practice, but this is a practice that has been done by Christians for many centuries that has proven to be very helpful and formative. The Daily Office is a way to structure our days so that we incorporate a regular rhythm of prayer and Scripture engagement into our daily lives.
Now, if you come from a Christian tradition that emphasized daily “quiet times” with the Lord, you might initially think that the Daily Office is just another name for a quiet time, but in fact, the Daily Office is something more than that. For while a quiet time is generally more freeform and emerges from what we feel like praying for that day and what Scriptures happen to come to mind, the Daily Office is a much more structured way of praying that incorporates a regular rhythm of Scripture reading, confession, prayers and creeds that have been prayed for centuries, and individual extemporaneous prayers. The Daily Office also includes prayers for the morning, afternoon, evening, and before bedtime.
While the Daily Office may sound overly restrictive and even too impersonal for some of us, it is the very structure that makes it such a rich practice. It is through the structure that the Holy Spirit moves.
For in praying the Daily Office, we are exposed again and again to the truths of who God is and the truths of who we are - truths that we might not be able to articulate so well on our own but truths that become more and more a part of our very being and believing as we repeat them again and again and even begin to memorize them.
In praying the Daily Office, we are exposed to the overarching story of Jesus and the Church as we read carefully curated Scriptures each day. This practice prevents us from just going to our go-to favorite passages and rather exposes us to a broader variety of Scripture, which then helps us have a comprehensive view of God’s redemptive plans in Jesus and of the Christian life.
In praying the Daily Office, we are led to pray not just for ourselves and our individual needs but also for the needs of the Church and the world, moving our daily prayers away from self-centeredness to God-centeredness and other-centeredness. Our prayers become far more rich and comprehensive.
And finally, in praying the Daily Office, we are given a beautiful means to pray communally. It works well in small and large groups, can be especially helpful for those who otherwise feel uncomfortable praying out loud or extemporaneously, and is even a communal practice when prayed alone in the comfort of one’s home for there are always countless other Christians around the country and world who are praying these same prayers.
So consider trying the Daily Office! Next week, I’ll give you some resources and tips for praying the Daily Office. In the meantime, try this online resource: https://www.dailyoffice2019.com
Living into the Christian Calendar
By the Rev. Kristen Yates
Last week, I began a series of posts speaking about the rhythmic nature of the Christian life, and today I would like to specifically talk about the Christian Calendar. I am not going to go into the history per se of its creation and adoption, but I will:
briefly outline the nature of each season,
explain why I believe the calendar is a helpful aspect of our spiritual formation,
and give you some ways to engage the calendar in your walk with Christ.
The Seasons
For a great overview video of the seasons, check this out:
Advent, the first season, begins in December and consists of 4 Sundays which lead up to Christmas. The season of Advent is characterized by longing, waiting, and hope as we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus and as we wait for his Second Coming. Because we reflect on the injustices of the world and the things that are not right in our life, Advent is actually a penitential season, and thus the color of the season is purple. The character of this season certainly stands in contrast to the extended Christmas season that our culture pushes, but by walking through Advent, we are much more prepared to truly enter into the full joy and celebratory nature of Christmas.
Christmas, the second season whose color is white, occurs over a period of twelve days starting on December 25th, and is the time of year we celebrate Jesus’ birth. It is a truly joyous time of feasting and celebration, and because it a season that holds such Good News, it is good for Christians to find ways to keep the celebration going for its whole length.
Epiphanytide, the third season whose color is green (also considered part of Ordinary Time), begins on January 6th, the Epiphany, the day when we recall the Magi finally arriving in Bethlehem to bring their gifts to Jesus. The word epiphany means an unveiling, a revealing, and so during this season of the Christian calendar, we spend time reflecting on the nature of God, allowing the Scriptures to reveal Jesus in his fullness. For Jesus was more than a good man who came to earth, but he was in fact God-made-flesh who came to this world to redeem it.
Lent, the fourth season, is a one that lasts 40 days, echoing the 40 days that the Israelites were in the desert and the 40 days that Jesus was tempted in the desert. It is a penitential season leading up to Easter; thus again, its color is purple. During this season, we reflect deeply on the ways we fail to love God and neighbor and how we turn from God, disobeying him and embracing life choices that are in stark contrast to God’s good designs and desires for us. It is a season of penitence, letting go, abstinence, self-reflection, confession, and prayers for God’s forgiveness and help. It is by walking through Lent that we are able to grasp the full meaning and joy of the Easter season that follows it.
Easter, the fifth season whose color is white, is the longest season of the Christian Calendar (that is excluding Ordinary Time). It lasts for 50 whole days, starting on Easter Sunday, which is the most important day in the entire year. During Easter, we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus and the redemption of the world. Since the Resurrection of Jesus is the greatest news the world has ever seen, it necessitates that the Church engage in an extended time of feasting and celebrating.
Pentecost, the sixth season whose color is red, follows on the heels of Easter and takes up the story of the Church. Whereas the first five seasons focused on the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the season of Pentecost focuses on the life of the Church. It begins with Pentecost Sunday, which commemorates the giving of the Holy Spirit to believers so that they might go forth into the world, extending God’s Good News to the ends of the earth. During Pentecost, we remember who we are in Christ, how God has empowered us, and how we are to be sent out into the world to be Jesus’ hands and feet.
Ordinary Time, the final season, whose color is green, wraps up the Christian calendar and lasts until the beginning of a new Advent. In this season, there is not the unique emphases of the other seasons, but during this time, the Church continues to reflect on all that Jesus said and did, as well as on the instructions that the apostles gave to the first believers in the Church. This reflection time gives opportunity for believers to consider how the truth of their faith shapes them and guides them as they live in the very ordinary details of their everyday lives.
Why is walking through the Christian Calendar helpful to our walk in Christ?
I believe that walking through the Christian Calendar is helpful to our growth in Christ because it helps us to see the whole story of Jesus and the Church each year, rather than letting us get stuck on a few favorite parts of the Scriptures or on our favorite Biblical emphases, which we are all prone to do. It is important that we are shaped by the whole story.
It also gives us opportunities to feast and to fast, to laugh and to cry, to celebrate God’s love for us and to also recognize our brokenness. It would do us no good, for example, if when we came to church, we always sang joyful, celebratory songs. For we also need times to lament of the brokenness of this world and ourselves. We also need times of self-reflection and penitence.
The seasons of the Christian Calendar allow us to worship God while giving voice to all the emotions that life evokes and by naming the true realities of ourselves and our world.
Additionally, the alternating times of feasting and fasting, and celebrating and lamenting in these seasons, give us opportunities to truly celebrate when we come to the feasting days and seasons.
For if we always feast, there is then nothing very special or truly celebratory about any of our feasting. These “feasts” are just part of our normal routine and they don’t necessary evoke a sense of joy, thankfulness, or worship in us. If, however, we fast before we feast and lament before we celebrate, then we can truly experience what feasting and celebration is meant to be.
For example, if we spend the season of Lent fasting, being truly self-reflective and penitent, and understanding why Jesus had to be crucified, then when Easter comes, we then can truly recognize what good news the Resurrection is. This Good News will then awaken true joy, thankfulness, and celebration in us in a much more meaningful and powerful way. And when we feast, we will truly feast!
So how do I practice the seasons of the Christian Calendar?
If you are a member of the Mission Cincinnati, then you are already practicing these seasons when you come to corporate worship each week.
There are, however, some things that you can do on your own, as well.
First, you can purchase a Christian Calendar or find one online, which will remind you of the seasons and the special days (and heroes and heroines of the faith) that are celebrated in each season. I recommend these resources:
Second, you can read through the lectionary, Bible passages assigned each day that will help you enter into the overarching story of God’s love and redemptive plans. I’ll talk about this more next week when I talk about the Daily Office.
Third, you can engage in particular practices on your own that will help you engage with each season more deeply. I won’t write about them here, but will write about them as our church community enters into each new season.
As we are currently in the season of Epiphanytide, my suggestion for you would be spend this season slowly reading through (or listening to) one of the Gospels and really wrestling with it.
My prayer for you as you engage this exercise is that God would reveal Jesus to you in new, fresh ways, so that you would see Jesus anew, perhaps in a fuller and clearer way than you have before.
Well, A Blessed Epiphanytide to you friends. May Christ reveal himself to you more and more as you walk through the Christian Calendar this year.
An Update from Angie from the Middle East
Did you know we support a missionary in the Middle East? Well, we do! Here’s Angie’s most recent update to our Mission Cincinnati family. Angie writes:
Hi, from the Arab world!
God has been doing such amazing things during my 6 months of travel around the Arab World. The Middle East is a very diverse region, which includes Arabs, Turks, Kurds, Bedouins, etc.! Though I've worked with Turks and Kurds for the past 4 years, this the first year I have been able to interact with Arabs in a deep and meaningful way. I am convinced the Father's love for Arabs is so special!
One of my Arab friends that I have connected to through my 3 months in the Arab Gulf region is named Sarah.
Sarah and I have been able to grow a beautiful friendship throughout my travels. She comes from a very wealthy, religiously conservative Muslim family. I am one of only two followers of Jesus she knows, and I feel privileged that she feels comfortable enough to talk with me about the struggles of life and faith. Sarah is searching for meaning, and I feel the Kingdom of God has come near to her! Pray for her as I feel she will soon come to believe Jesus to be the way to God and join our Family!
The next 2.5 months will be spent in Lebanon. Myself and a team of 5 others from Egypt, China, America, and Lebanon have been given amazing opportunities to do discipleship trainings at local fellowships, as well as to serve Syrian and Iraqi refugees within the country. We will be living near refugee camps, both distributing aid and getting to know families that live there.
I am looking forward to seeing God's Kingdom come in power to those that are most vulnerable in this time in history. The testimonies I have already heard of healings, miracles, and true joy being found by people living in the camps is exciting!
Please pray for my team and I, that we would be united in heart and purpose to see His Kingdom in Lebanon! And if you'd like to be on my quarterly email update, ask Kristen for my email address!
Thank you for all your prayers! Many blessings to you all, my Mission Cincinnati family!
Establishing Life-Giving Rhythms and Practices This Year
By the Rev. Kristen Yates (modified from its original post in The Vine and the Way)
Christians by nature are a profoundly rhythmic people. So were their Jewish ancestors.
Perhaps, it is just because nature itself is rhythmic. When God established the heavens and earth, He imbedded rhythms into the created order. All throughout creation, we find patterns of productivity and rest. Plants, animals, fungi, and even bacteria have circadian rhythms, biological processes that display an oscillation of activity over a 24-hour period.
If we look further outward, we find that the earth itself experiences rhythms due to its rotations around its bent axis and its rotation around the sun, resulting in periods of day and night and seasons throughout the year. Depending on the time of day and the season of the year, organisms will go between more productive times and more quiet times.
So it is not surprising that like the Creation itself, Christians, find themselves living into life-giving rhythms of productivity and Sabbath, as well as rhythms of prayer and work; joy and lament; feasting and fasting; celebrating and abstaining; community and solitude; and activism and stillness.
For centuries, Christians and their Jewish forbearers, have structured their weeks in response to God’s call to be co-creators with Him for six days of week and on the seventh day to rest and worship and delight in Him.
They have also structured their days so as to integrate regular prayer into their work, eating, rest, and play.
Since the earliest times, Christians have also structured their years around feast days and celebrations – days throughout the year that help them regularly walk through the life and death of Jesus Christ and the early days of the Church as the Good News of Jesus began to spread.
In addition to all this, Christians have naturally found themselves ebbing and flowing into different seasons of the spiritual life as they have journeyed through the ups and downs of life. As such, they have learned to engage different rhythms and practices of discipleship in each season.
Perhaps, this idea of having rhythms in one’s walk with Jesus is a new concept to you. Or perhaps you are familiar with it, but it has become stale or rote. One way or the other, in this new year, we would love to introduce you to the wonderful practice of establishing life-giving rhythms in your spiritual life and to help you establish such rhythms.
Next week, I’ll write about practicing the Seasons in the Christian Calendar. The following week, I’ll talk about the practice of the Daily Office, and the following week after that, I’ll write about creating a personal Rule of Life (not to worry - this is not about legalisms, but establishing life-giving rhythms for living into what we say we value most.)
May you live into Godly and Life-Giving Rhythms in 2020!
MISSION MATTERS | Sparking A Jesus Movement in the Next Generation
I had a fascinating conversation with a friend a couple weeks ago about what the church’s role could be in helping to shape a better common future in our nation.
In the course of this conversation, he said, “The American Church, big C, [due especially to its recent political enmeshments and blatant power-grabbing] scares the hell out of so, so many people right now. And that makes sense to me. It’s like the grim reaper inviting folks over for a dinner party. Nobody wants to go. The Church would like to have some sort of say in the future…but people want the Church as far away from the future, and any shaping of it as possible.”
Equally fascinating when I asked him what sorts of people he thinks most folks want CLOSE to the shaping of our nation’s future, he said, “Generous innovators, maybe?”
It strikes me that we have arrived at a day and age in 1st world Western society where, when people hear the word “church,” they think building or institution….probably one run by grey-haired political bundlers. And I understand wanting nothing to do with that. A political machine wearing the costume of religion sounds terrifying, and certainly something that could not fairly be associated with the person of Jesus and His vision for His body on the Earth.
But what did Jesus envision? What is the church He imagined when He laid down His life for her on a Roman cross supposed to look like according to Christ?
First off, it is something ALIVE, ORGANIC. In John 15, Jesus speaks of Himself as the true vine and His Father as a gardener who preserves and promotes the fruitfulness of the vine. Furthermore, Jesus speaks of His followers as branches that come off of the vine, branches that cannot bear fruit or remain alive apart from their connection to Christ. Elsewhere in 1 Corinthians, the Apostle Paul speaks of the church as the Body of Christ, made up of many people and parts of which Christ is the head. Thus, the church as Jesus imagines it, is a relational entity—connected to Him and connected to each other.
Second, Jesus’ church is FOR the world. In Genesis 12, God made a friendship and a pact with a man named Abram, promising to be Abram’s God and to make Abram’s kids, His people. Along down the line, God would make Abram’s kids into a great nation…but not for their own benefit. Their greatness, and indeed all of God’s investment in Abram was from the beginning SO THAT ALL NATIONS ON EARTH would be blessed! What God did in Abram’s life was ultimately supposed to be for everyone’s good. And so it is supposed to be with the church. In Matthew 28:18, Jesus says He holds all authority in heaven and on Earth, and with that authority He says to His followers “GO into every nation of the Earth to teach, baptize, and bless!” For the Christian, the fruit of faith is not just goodness for me and God but goodness IN me FOR the world God has placed me in. The church’s intimate connection with Jesus is not a grace to be hoarded but always and essentially meant to be given away for the blessing of others: for the healing of the sick, the helping of the poor, and the breaking of chains of oppression and injustice.
Third, the church is meant to bear witness to its Lord. In 1 Peter, the Apostle Peter’s concern for the morality of the Christians scattered in foreign nations was not out of a desire for their moral superiority or a desire to “make them better people.” Rather, Peter’s concern was the belief and the blessing of the nations. The holiness of the Christian was for the good of others: so that others might recognize God at work and give their lives to Jesus as well, in turn being healed and transformed. Jesus’ church is called to be holy, distinct, and set apart from the world. But this holiness should never position the church AGAINST the world as if God and His people were anti-everyone else. Rather, Christian set-apart-ness has always been envisioned by Jesus as a way to bless others and point others toward the Good News of His life, death, and resurrection, and the possibility of accessing that life NOW through faith.
Finally, the church at its best has always been a fellowship of GENEROUS INNOVATORS. In most times and places throughout history, the church has NOT operated from a position of societal privilege or influence. At its best, Jesus’ church has been a persecuted fringe movement, cobbling together meager resources through prayer and generosity to try to complete the task God has called them to. As a scrappy, underdog, the church has had to innovate. Acts 2:42-47 shows the devotion of the early believers to the teachings of the Scriptures, sharing meals and resources together, meeting house to house, and caring for each others’ needs. When plagues swept Rome centuries later, Christians were the ones in the gutters caring for the sick. When Roman citizens exposed unwanted babies to the elements, Christians would adopt them. The Christian belief that God was not Himself a part of nature allowed Renaissance and Enlightenment scientists to study material creation and in so doing make incredible discoveries and advances. 18th century Christians championed health care and education, and Christians in British Parliament were critical to ending the modern slave trade. At its most faithful and fruitful, the church of Jesus has always been a future-making. Chasing Christ with meager resources, believers have found fresh ways forward that have aided surrounding cities and nations with blessing and goodness regardless of belief.
At The Mission Cincinnati, we want the church to become like this again. We are just one little c church. We believe we are a PART of the Kingdom of God in Cincinnati. We’re not the whole story, but we are a part of it. And the role we feel called to play in this next season is to cultivate the types of conditions in our midst where a movement can begin, specifically a Jesus movement in the next generation. In our first sermon series of 2020, entitled “MISSION MATTERS: Sparking a Jesus Movement for the Next Generation” we’ll be exploring what Scripture has to say about God’s heart for the world and how we can become this type of church and spark this type of movement in our city today.
We’d love to invite you to join us! To help us spark a Jesus movement in the next generation. There are many ways to get involved but the best first step is joining us on Sunday mornings for worship at 10 AM at the Evanston Recreation Center (3204 Woodburn Ave. 45207). You’ll meet great people and join in a beautiful service of music, prayer, teaching, and communion. Nursery care and children’s ministry are available each week. You’ll learn about tons of ways to belong in community, grow in your relationship with Christ, serve within the church, and go into the wider world as part of a fellowship of missionaries. We can’t wait to meet you!
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us at william@missioncincinnati.org. Also explore our website and learn more about what you can expect from our community.
Grace, peace, and blessings in Christ,
Fr. William
All I Want for Advent
It’s happening again.
Commercials about new cars topped with giant red bows are filling up the ad breaks in my Hulu shows, rumors of Black Friday specials are creeping into my newsfeed, and for some reason I can’t get that stupid song “All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth,” out of my head.
You know what this means: “the holidays” have arrived.
As a little kid, I loved this season. The annual ritual of driving from Atlanta (where I grew up) to Knoxville for Thanksgiving, and returning home in time to decorate the house for Christmas (ALWAYS on the weekend AFTER Thanksgiving!) is deeply etched into my emotional memory. I still have my childhood Advent calendar, and I still remember waiting with my sister outside my mom’s bedroom door on early December Saturdays for “mommy wrapping machine” to finish disguising yet another exciting present we would have to wait a few more days to open. I remember how Christmas Eve used to feel like magic as my mind was a-blur with the mingled stories of Santa and Jesus, lit candles and wrapped gifts. Perhaps what I loved most about those days each year, was how powerful the sense of expectation was.
We lose things as we grow up.
Many of us lose our childhood sense of wonder as we learn more and more about how the world really works and that (**spoiler alert!) Santa isn’t real. There are no mysteries anymore for the initiated. Everything in our mechanical universe has an explanation. Some of us lose our joy over what we wanted to be when we grow up when we actually become that doctor (or astronaut), when we actually find that long-imagined lover and start a family and learn that communication is hard work and kids are messy and loud. Some of us lose spouses, friends, or loved ones to divorce, death, or the slow separation of time and distance. And when we stare into the face of our losses, Christmas and “the holidays,” feel less magical and more masochistic; a societal choreography forcing us to move through the motions of a feigned joy that does nothing more than remind us of the good things we used to have but don’t anymore.
I want things for Christmas this year…but not presents.
I want my childhood wonder back. I want my friend’s divorce undone, his marriage repaired, and his heart healed. I want people around me who have died this year to come back to life. I want the power to fix other people’s pain, to be able to press a button and end their hurt. I want peace between nations and peace in my heart. I want to lock anxiety in a box and ship it to Mars or drop it in the deepest part of the ocean. I want to see our politics de-polarized, and for us to stop our ridiculous partisan bickering. I want my friends who have lost their faith to find it again. I want to be able to express my love to my family and friends in a way that is clear and not needy. I want people everywhere to have real hope.
I can’t manufacture those things and Santa can’t deliver them. But Jesus can.
For the last few years, I have needed Advent even more than Christmas. Because I need intellectual honesty in my faith. I need room to reconcile the hard things I experience with the good things I believe. Advent makes space for this. In their wisdom, Christians in history designated time on the church calendar before Christmas, to live deeply into a season of anticipation and expectation for Christ to come into the world as an infant in the glory of the Incarnation, and to come back again at the end of time as benevolent King of a fully-realized, cosmic Kingdom. In Advent, we wait. We long. We GROAN. We sit with recently exiled Ancient Israel whose people haven’t heard God speak to them in 500 years. We clutch the letter of Revelation desperate for hope and assurance of God’s love for us, alongside 1st century Christians whose friends had been ripped from their homes, strung up on trees in Emperor Nero’s Garden, and lit on fire as mood lighting for parties. And we cry out “how long!?” with our brothers and sisters whose families are driven from their homes by violence in Africa, or whose lives are torn apart by drugs and gun violence on our own American streets. Advent affirms that waiting and longing have always been part of what it means to be a Christian. This season shows me that I can feel deep sadness AND hold on to real hope. I can acknowledge the truth of ALL the hard things in the world, feel ALL of the emotions, and still be a Christian. And Advent also reminds me, that the full range of human experience and emotion takes place between the starting point of our world’s creation at the hands of a God of inestimable love, and its conclusion when Jesus, the Son of that same God comes back to topple oppressors, end violence forever, raise dead people, and wipe every tear from every eye.
THAT LAST PART IS ALL I WANT FOR ADVENT. It’s what every Christian throughout history has wanted. And it’s not just an empty promise. It’s a true and certain hope that we can bank on.
The Apostle Paul says it this way in Romans 13:11-12: “the hour has come for you to awake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now that when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So the let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.”
You may not get back all the things you’ve lost in this life. I can’t promise you will feel the same wonder tomorrow you felt yesterday. But if you are in Christ, you WILL get Jesus: coming back to you at the end of time to set every wrong right, heal every wound, and make all things new. And as Advent reminds us, its okay to WANT THAT. To LONG for Christ’s return and the final repair He will bring, to cry out with every fiber of your being—in grief or in joy—for Him to come back and make our world new. Because practicing that longing is not an exercise in wishful thinking. It is a pressing of our souls into the deepest and most true reality of the universe that is meant to give us ultimate and durable joy and hope: Jesus is coming back to make everything new.
That’s all I want for Advent. How about you?
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New to Advent? Has this article peaked your curiosity about what it might look and feel like to press into this season of longing and expectation for Christ to come back into our world? Looking for a community to press into this season with? We’d love to invite you to journey through Advent with us at The Mission Cincinnati. We gather every Sunday in December until Christmas at 10 AM at the Evanston Recreation Center (3204 Woodburn Ave. Cincinnati OH 45207) for special Advent worship services. Have some questions or want more info? Contact us at william@missioncincinnati.org.
A Special Litany of Penitence for Christians Brokenhearted over Gun Violence, Immigration, and Political Division
On Sunday, August 11th, we made space during our quarterly prayer service to join together in a special litany of penitence that made space to name the evils of racism, white supremacy, hatred, and violence that are running rampant in our nation, to grieve and lament over the brokenness of our world, to repent of our complicity through action and inaction, and to confess again that the crucified and risen Jesus is the only true hope in our world.
We have decided to make this litany available for any who would like to use it as a personal or corporate resource for prayer. Please note that this litany uses some couplets originally used in worship at The Mission Chattanooga in Chattanooga TN with much original content created by the staff of The Mission Cincinnati.
A SPECIAL LITANY OF PENETENCE | Prayer Service 8.11.2019
Leader: Lord, rightly seeing and adoring You for who You are frees our hearts and minds to clearly see ourselves. And standing before your beauty and majesty, power and holiness, love and perfection, our own fallenness is ever more apparent. Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open and all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden, cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your holy name. Let us move now into a time of confession.
Call to Holiness & Confession of Sin
Leader: Who is it that you seek?
All: We seek the Lord our God.
Leader: Do you seek him with all your heart?
All: Amen. Lord, have mercy.
Leader: Do you seek him with all your soul?
All: Amen. Lord, have mercy.
Leader: Do you seek him with all your mind?
All: Amen. Lord, have mercy.
Leader: Do you seek him with all your strength?
All: Amen. Lord, have mercy.
Leader: Do you seek to love your neighbor as yourself?
All: Amen. Christ, have mercy.
Leader: Let us enter into a time of silence as we invite the Holy Spirit to search our hearts.
Silence 1 – 2 minutes (allow the Holy Spirit to search your heart)
Leader: Dear friends in Christ, here in the presence of the Almighty with penitent and obedient hearts we confess our sins, so that we may obtain forgiveness by his infinite goodness and mercy. Let us observe another space of silence as we bring our sins, our brokenness, and our need into Christ’s presence, laying our burdens at the cross, and asking Him to meet us where we are…
Silence 1 – 2 minutes (bring your sins to the cross of Christ…invite Him to meet you where you are…)
SONG OF CONFESSION/THANKFULNESS can be played if desired
Litany of Penitence
The Celebrant and People together, all kneeling
All: Most holy and merciful Father: We confess to you and to one another, and to the whole communion of saints in heaven and on earth, that we have sinned by our own fault in thought, word, and deed; by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.
Leader 1: We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others, as we have been forgiven.
All: Have mercy on us, Lord.
(some silence may be kept after each petition)
Leader 2: We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us. We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit.
All: Have mercy on us, Lord
Leader 1: We confess the times when we, Your people have been silent in the face of injustices that injure minorities, the disempowered, the refugees, and the less fortunate in our nation. We confess the times when we have ignored your Word and have been slow to name and stand against evils of racism, white supremacy, and hatred in our nation.
All: Have mercy on us, Lord
Leader 2: We bring to you our feelings of fear, numbness, grief, and anger over the tragedies of gun violence and the separation of families at the U.S. –Mexican border that continue to wound and divide our nation. We confess our desire to act in a way that would establish peace, and dignify all people as image bearers of God.
All: We confess to you, Lord
Leader 1: We confess our doubt and confusion over how best to make change. We confess our great need for your wisdom Jesus, your courage, and your love to help us understand and work with those we disagree with, to find a faithful way forward that reveals the Kingdom and heart of God in our nation.
All: We confess to You, Lord.
Leader 2: We confess the times we have forgotten to care for the lonely, minister to the poor, foster mental health, and help those suffering from mental illness. We confess the times we have labeled people in our lives or our nation as hopeless, too far gone, and beyond help.
All: We confess to You, Lord
Leader 1: We confess our compassion fatigue, and our cynicism toward media, activism, and even prayer.
All: We confess to You, Lord
Leader 2: We confess the times we have made enemies out of those we disagree with politically or theologically. We have often failed to see the image of God in them and we have failed to love them as Christ first loved us.
All: Have mercy on us, Lord.
Leader 1: We confess the times we have looked to partisan politics for salvation. We pray for forgiveness for the times we have forgotten that the crucified and resurrected Jesus is still the only true hope for our broken world and our broken hearts.
All: We confess to you, Lord.
Leader 2: Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done: for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty,
All: Accept our repentance, Lord.
Leader 1: For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us,
All: Accept our repentance, Lord.
Leader 2: Restore us, good Lord, and let your anger depart from us;
All: Favorably hear us, for your mercy is great.
Leader 1: Accomplish in and through us the work of your salvation,
All: That we may show forth your glory and transforming love in the world.
Leader 2: By the cross and passion of your Son our Lord,
All: Bring us with all your saints to the joy of his resurrection.
Leader 1: We will now observe a space of silence for you to make your private, silent
confessions and lamentations to the Lord.
(Silence is observed…1-2 minutes)
Kyrie (can be sung or spoken in unison)
All: Lord have mercy,
Christ have mercy
Lord have mercy upon us.
THANKSGIVING
Leader 1: (priestly) Amen, and hear then the good news: all who are in Christ Jesus are a
new creation. The old is gone and the new has come. By the power of Christ’s shed blood on the cross, I proclaim that you are forgiven ones and Your sins have been removed from you as far as the east is from the west.
What's Been Missing in the Ways We Do Discipleship?
By the Rev. Kristen Yates
When you hear the word discipleship, what comes to mind? What does it mean to be a disciple and what activities does it entail?
According to my friends over at Gravity Leadership, for many of us who have grown up in the Western church, discipleship mostly has entailed two components: certitude and morality, in other words, cultivating right belief and engaging in right action whether in personal life or on a larger societal scale (you might call this behavioral modification).
What this has translated into over the years is an emphasis on Bible study, theology classes, and worship services heavy on teaching, as well as moral behavior and plenty of opportunities for service, mission, and advocacy.
Now, depending on our particular church or denomination, the emphasis we experienced may have been more on the head aspect (the cultivating of right belief) or it may have been on the hands aspect (engaging in right action), but one way or the other, it is likely for many of us that our church ignored or undervalued an important third component of discipleship: heart transformation or what we might call spiritual formation.
While the head and hands components of discipleship are certainly important, without the heart component, such discipleship can eventually fall flat and we can even burn out. For it is not enough to know the right things about God or to try to do the right things through our own willpower. A disciple’s heart must be continually transformed by the Holy Spirit if he or she is going to follow Jesus for the long haul and become more and more like Jesus.
As people, we have all kinds of desires that move us to action; it’s why Jesus constantly asked people in the Bible, “What do you want?” for He was helping people to uncover their desires, both the godly and the distorted ones. Well, as for our distorted desires, if they are left untransformed, they’ll eventually move us into wrong action or at least inhibit us from moving into Kingdom action even if at the current moment, we are somehow able to toe the line.
Perhaps, worst of all, distorted desires will prevent us from entering into the deep intimacy and love relationship with God that He desires for us, which is, after all, what is most important in the discipleship journey. The truth is that God loves us because He created us, not because we do things for Him or because we have “crossed every t and dotted every i” when it comes to our understanding of God. God loves us and wants to draw close to us. This increasing intimacy from simply “being with Jesus” is the pinnacle of our discipleship journey.
And guess what, if we are abiding in Jesus’s love, everything else (including right beliefs and right actions) will eventually flow out of that deep well of love – not of course automatically or all at once, but gradually as God is present to us and and as He slowly but surely transforms our hearts.
So friends, as we continue on our discipleship journey, we are called to tend to our hearts. Holistic discipleship involves tending to our heads, our hands, and our hearts. In an upcoming post, I’ll talk about how we can practically do this.
THINK & DRINK WEEK 1 | How Can Technology Help Us to be Present?
Technology, most broadly defined, is anything we make or use to extend our personal power.
- A hammer is a technology in that it extends the length and focuses the power of our arms to drive a nail into a wall.
- The interstate highway system is a technology that it increases our ability to move rapidly across our nation and around our cities.
- A telescope is a technology that multiplies the power of our eyesight through a combination of lenses so that we can see incredibly distant objects in great detail.
Humans from our earliest days of historical record have been creating technologies.
- The iconic example of the cave man and the wheel
- The discovery of combining flint and tinder to create fire
- The fixing of a sharp rock to the end of a stick to create a spear capable of taking down a mammoth.
But we are living in an age in which the SPEED of technological advancement is RAPIDLY increasing.
- It took several centuries for weaponry to advance from swords and longbows to rifles and machine guns, but only a couple decades to go from machine guns to nuclear bombs.
- It took almost 2,000 years to go from the cutting edge technology of Roman roads to the trailblazing wonders of the American transcontinental railroad…but only 200 years to go from the railroad to the digital and globally connecting pathways of the internet.
We are beginning to recognize that the PACE of technological innovation throughout human history has not been LINEAR but rather EXPONENTIAL.
For the majority of our collective history, we have been living through the flat part of the beginning of the curve, but the line is steepening, our collective creative productivity multiplying, and with it our world and lives changing faster and faster.
This increased pace of change has subjected TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION to MORAL, ETHICAL, and even SPIRITUAL EXAMINATION:
- With the Advent of technologies that so dramatically increase a human being’s ability to affect the world around us, and even technologies that are implanted into our bodies to augment or change our physicality,
- What does it mean to be HUMAN in a technologically transforming world?
- Is there something essential to the human body, mind, consciounesness, or experience that we need to GUARD against technological advance?
- Albert Einstein once said, “it has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity,” Is this true? If so, should we be worried about it? How should we respond?
- Is technology good or evil? We have begun to ask.
And while there are extreme positions on both sides
- from futurists who believe human destiny lies in building our own technological utopia on one side
- to anti-technological Luddites who believe technology is the devil on the other,
- the collection of mainstream views on the moral, ethical and spiritual quality of technology seems to assert that while technology itself is neutral (i.e. neither inherently good nor evil), the USES to which it is put in human hands can be GREATLY good or evil.
- This position could be summed up by the famous T-shirt quote: “Guns don’t kill people, I kill people.”
- the implication of course being that technology is not the angel or the devil, but the person WEILDING the technology.
And while I agree with this mainstream viewpoint, I don’t think it goes deep enough or captures a complete enough picture.
- You’ve likely heard the phrase “those who live by the sword, will die by the sword.”
- A contemporary version of this expression could be “those who use smart phones frequently, will inevitably find their lives SHAPED by the smart phone.”
The technologies we USE INFLUENCE US.
- Author James K.A. Smith writes about this principle through his discussion of religious worship. “Liturgy,” or the collective order, rites, and practices of worship, is a sort of religious technology created to SHAPE religious adherents toward their desired spiritual ends.
- As we engage repeatedly and over time in a specific liturgy, that liturgy will have a shaping influence over our spirituality.
- Scientific studies of neuro-plasticity back this up.
o Your brain is not static, it is malleable.
o Practices you engage in frequently will stimulate your brain in a specific way and cause your brain to reorganize itself to desire and expect that specific stimulus.
o The neurological shorthand for this says that brain nerves and synapse pathways that “fire together, wire together.”
o This is how addictions from substance abuse to obsessively checking your facebook app for notifications form.
- Undeniably, our societal and cultural liturgy in the West is a TECHNOLOGICAL one.
o Everyday we engage with a multiplicity of technologies.
o And while we intend to use these technologies for good or evil,
o We must likewise recognize that they are shaping US even as we are wielding THEM.
§ I INTEND to use Facetime technology to connect with friends and family across the world…an undeniable good…
§ But oftentimes this expansive ACCESS to people and events across the world can pull my attention away from the here and now.
§ My body could be in my living room with my family…but my brain could be with my friend on vacation in Thailand.
§ And this DIFFUSION of my focus and my power…assisted by technology…actually decreases my joy and limits my connection with BOTH my family who is present as well as my friend who is far away.
§ University of Montana philosopher Albert Borgman speaks of the “blessed burdens” of human limitations: our brains are biologically designed to work best when focusing on 1 task…not multitasking, psychologically we only have the capacity for 30-40 close friendships or significant relationships, not 5,000 facebook friends.
And so the question is this: how can we engage with technology in a way that we maximize the GOOD in our world and in our lives? What practices can we live into ourselves and/or advocate to others that could shape us as good, wise, and benevolent USERS of technology for good purposes
- There are many different specific applications of these questions.
- The biggest one, I personally have at the moment is “how can technology serve to INCREASE our ability to be PRESENT where we are?”
- I.e. can a smart phone increase my ability to love my family and be present to my neighbors.
- If so, how?
- What practices could I add to my cultural liturgy so as to make sure technology serves me in the way I intend rather than me serving technology as it intends.
You may have different questions about specific technologies, so as we break into groups for discussion I’d love to invite your conversation and discussion around these questions:
1) How can we engage with technology in a way that maximizes the GOOD in our world and in our lives?
2) What practices can we live into ourselves and/or advocate to others that will shape us as good, wise, and benevolent USERS of technology for good purposes?
3) What moral, ethical, spiritual questions are rising up for you in your life right now as you consider your own use of technology and how its usage is shaping your life?
Serving Dayton in the Aftermath of the Tornadoes
Right before Jesus ascended to the Father, he told his followers, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)
At the Mission Cincinnati, we have a particular call to be witnesses to Jesus in our neighborhood of Evanston and of Uptown Cincinnati more generally. This is that place that we might call “our Jerusalem.” It is where we primarily feel called to preach the Gospel in Word, Deed, and Power, and we are so excited to do so.
From time to time, however, we know that God will call us further afield to our Judea’s, Samaria’s, and to the ends of the earth. Thus, as Christ’s family, we are called to continually keep our eyes and hearts open for the opportunities to partner and serve with others outside our main area of mission.
Well, just this past week, an opportunity to serve in “our Judea” has arisen, and I am asking our people to pray about ways we may serve. As you know, unfortunately last week, several tornadoes ripped through parts of Dayton, Ohio and wreaked a lot of havoc – trees were knocked down, fences were broken, roofs were ripped off, and in the worst of cases, houses were completely lost. As a result, there is a lot of work that needs to be done to cleanup and rebuild these neighborhoods, and to bring comfort to those effected by the storms.
Thankfully there are churches in the Dayton area that are organizing efforts to help with this work. If you would like to help them, there are many ways to do so, and I can personally attest to their good work. So for example, this past weekend, I joined in with Crossroads Dayton and Be Hope Church in Beavercreek to help with the cleanup. On Saturday, I joined with hundreds of others from all around the area. We brought water, food, toiletries, and other items for the people effected by the tornadoes; and we divided into smaller groups to help do some clean-up at houses all around the area. It was a blessed time of serving together, getting to know others and talking with the locals, and we accomplished a great deal. The work, however, is not done yet.
So, something that you all might consider. As the work continues into the coming weeks, consider gathering a group of friends from the Mission and beyond in the upcoming weeks and take a day trip up to Dayton. To find out ways you can help, be in contact with Be Hope Church or Crossroads at http://behope.church/relief/ or www.crossroads.net/reachout.
Blessings,
Rev. Kristen
"God For Us": An Explanation of Lent and Some Suggested Practices for the Season
By Rev. Kristen Yates
Lent is almost here, friends, and we are excited at the Mission Cincinnati to journey through this season together. If you come from a tradition that does not follow the Christian Calendar, you may be wondering what Lent is all about.
Well, in the simplest terms, Lent is the 40-day period prior to Easter that starts with Ash Wednesday. It is a time of devotion and discipline as we prepare our hearts for the great celebration of Jesus’ Resurrection on Easter Sunday. (By the way, the Sundays in Lent are not counted in this 40-day penitential period since Sundays are always feast days.) As we journey through this 40-day period together, we keep a double focus.
On one hand, during Lent, we seriously consider sin and our fallen human condition. If we are truthful with ourselves, during this season of Lent, we say with the apostle Paul “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do” (Romans 7:15). During Lent, we admit that we are sinful individuals – that we continually wrestle with pride, self-centeredness, hatred, a need to be in control, envy, prejudice, and many other vices.
On the other hand, we also reflect on the Christian hope throughout the entire season of Lent. Though we are sinful, Christ so loved the world that He died for us while we were still sinners and then He was raised from the dead, opening up the possibility for those who believe to be reconciled with Himself.
Not only that, but he opened up the possibility of healing, transformation into Christlikeness, and abundant life through the power of the Holy Spirit working within us. So, in Lent, we are always looking forward to the triumph of Easter Day even as we grapple with the our fallen conditions.
So while Advent (the Season before Christmas) can be said to be about “God with us”, Lent (the Season before Easter) can be said to be about “God for us”. As Greg Pennoyer says,
“If Advent/Christmas is a revelation of God’s presence with us, then Lent/Easter is a revelation of God’s desire to use all of life for our wholeness and our healing – the revelation that he will pull life from death. . . . Lent and Easter reveal the God who is for us in all of life – for our liberation, for our healing, for our wholeness. Lent and Easter remind us that even in death there can be found resurrection.” (Pennoyer, “God for Us”, x)
So with this great truth in mind, we enter into this season of Lent with a firm sense of God’s love for us, as well as a desire to engage practices that will open us up to God’s healing, liberation, and transformation.
And so friends, since the earliest of times, it has been typical in the season of Lent to take on some new rhythm of prayer, self-examination, confession, fasting, and giving/generosity. We give up certain habits and take on other habits so that we might we might become more like Christ and so that we might grow closer in our relationship with Him.
Some of you may be wondering, however, “how do we do this?” So, with this question in mind, I have compiled a list of suggested practices that you might take on during this season. You can find it below.
Before you check out this list, however, let me provide the following caution. Please do not feel as if you should do all of these. Especially if you are new to Lent, take on one or two new practices and put your energy into those.
Remember that the point of these practices is not to check off as may boxes as possible but to be self-reflective, to draw closer to Christ, and to open yourself up to the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. So consider which practices will help you do this the best in this season. And if you are unfamiliar with these practices, consider coming to Oasis on Wednesday nights, where we will engage in some of them throughout the season. Also seek me out for guidance.
Blessings,
Kristen+
Practices for Lent - Some Online Resources
Daily Lenten Devotionals – Take on a daily Lenten devotional. There are many out there, but here are two that I suggest for you:
· An American Lent– Given our church’s context, I believe this would be a great devotional for us as a church to engage this season. Written by priests in our denomination, as well as others, this devotional will lead us through a process of understanding the 400 years of slavery, oppression, and racism that have existed in our country and will invite us into a process of reflection and prayer.
· Center for Christianity, Culture and Arts (Biola) Lenten Project -- This beautiful online devotional, which is newly re-imagined each year, takes you through Lent with beautiful art, music, and reflection on Scripture.
Prayer– Consider taking on practices of daily prayer, examen, or lectio divina during this season. You can find explanations of these practices at The Vine and the Way, my spiritual formation blog, as well as find links out to prayer resources.
Fasting and Feasting– Consider taking on rhythms of fasting and feasting during the Season. Here are three articles to help you understand what fasting is all about: “Fasting for Lent” and “Fasting and Feasting for Lent” and How to Fast for Lent. Also, you may consider fasting from a habit, a habit that in itself may not be bad, but seems to be increasingly taking you away from “loving God and loving neighbor”, a habit that is becoming a bit of an idol, is controlling you rather than you controlling it. (i.e., many people give up social media for Lent.)
Reading Scripture– Take on a Scripture reading plan or join a Bible study for this Season. If you are a woman, consider joining Katie Mosley’s Women’s Bible Study this Lent. As another option, Anne Rothaas also suggests this Bible study on Job that you can do on your own. If you would like to wrestle more with some of the content of Anne’s sermon from a couple of weeks ago, this could be a good study for you.
SUNDAY 1.13.19 Live Stream Liturgy
Preparing Our Hearts
Opening Sentence of Scripture
Officiant: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Philippians 1:2
Confession of Sin
Officiant: Dearly beloved, the Scriptures teach us the importance of acknowledging our many sins and offenses, not concealing them from our heavenly Father, but confessing them with humble and obedient hearts that we may obtain forgiveness by his infinite goodness and mercy. We ought at all times humbly to acknowledge our sins before Almighty God, but especially when we come together in his presence to give thanks for the great benefits we have received at his hands, to declare his most worthy praise, to hear his holy Word, and to ask, for ourselves and others, those things necessary for our life and our salvation.
Therefore, come with me to the throne of heavenly grace.
Silence is kept. The Officiant and People say the following.
Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us;
that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your Name. Amen.
Officiant: Amen and hear then the good news! That all who are in Christ Jesus are a new creation. The old is gone and the new has come. By the power of Christ’s shed blood on the cross, I proclaim that you are forgiven ones, and your sins have been removed from you as far as the east is from the west! Let us rejoice therefore and let us worship our King!
All Amen.
The Invitatory
Officiant O Lord, open our lips.
People And our mouth shall proclaim your praise.
Officiant O God, make speed to save us;
People O Lord, make haste to help us.
Officiant Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy
Spirit;
People As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
Officiant Praise the Lord.
People The Lord’s name be praised.
Song of Worship – 10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord)
Hearing God’s Word
Scripture Readings – Genesis 1:1-2 &
Sermon
Responding to God’s Word
The Apostles’ Creed – All together
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
Officiant: Here at The Mission Cincinnati, we practice an ancient method of call and
response prayer. I will voice our collective prayers and petitions to the Lord, and after each section, I will say “Lord in Your mercy,” and you are invited to respond “Hear our prayer!” Let us go together before the Lord in prayer.
People: And with your spirit.
Officiant: Let us pray.
Officiant: And now as our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ taught us, we are bold to pray
together:
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in
heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who
Trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,
forever and ever. Amen.
The General Thanksgiving
Officiant and People all say together:
Almighty God, Father of all mercies,
we your humble servants give you thanks
for all your goodness and loving-kindness
to us and to all whom you have made.
We bless you for our creation, preservation,
and all the blessings of this life;
but above all for your immeasurable love
in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ;
for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory.
And, we pray, give us, such an awareness of your mercies,
that with truly thankful hearts we may show forth your praise, not only with
our lips, but in our lives,
by giving up our selves to your service,
and by walking before you
in holiness and righteousness all our days;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit,
be honor and glory throughout all ages. Amen.
A Prayer of St. John Chrysostom
Officiant:
Almighty God, you have given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplications to you; and you have promised through your well beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his name you will be in the midst of them: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting.
People: Amen.
Blessing God and Receiving His Blessing
The Blessing
Officiant:. The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord; and the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among you, and remain with you always. Amen.
The Dismissal
Officiant:. Go in peace to love and serve the Lord
The people say the following in response to the dismissal:
People Thanks be to God.
Thank you for joining us for worship today.
Finding True Joy in the Season of Advent/Practices of the Season
- Rev. Kristen Yates, Pastor for Spiritual Formation and Congregational Care
God’s Faithfulness and Our Honesty Before God
Advent is here, and I am excited! Now, I don’t know about you, but Advent is my favorite season of the Christian Calendar, and it’s not just the lights, music, celebrations, and retelling of wondrous Biblical stories that bring me delight in this season. I do absolutely love those aspects of the season, but my real sense of joy comes from time spent meditating on God’s loving faithfulness and time spent being honest with God in this season. Perhaps more than any other season, Advent allows me to give expression to my full range of emotions – from joy to wonder to hope to sadness to yearning to anger to fear. I love that about Advent. I need that.
You see, in Advent, we not only wait to celebrate Jesus’ birth on December 25th, but we also wait in great anticipation for the Second Coming of Jesus when He will return in glory and will finally restore and renew all things.
On one hand, this waiting brings hope as we begin to imagine this renewed world where no tears will be shed and justice and peace will reign. On the other hand, it opens up a space for longing, frustration, lament, and yes even fear and anger as we grapple with the world as it is now and ask God, “How long Lord? How long will it be before you return and make things right?”
This waiting also opens up a space for self-reflection as we wrestle with how we ourselves contribute to the brokenness in our relationships and in the world, and as we wait for God to renew our own hearts.
The truth is that the world is broken. We are broken. And Advent gives us space to grapple with this reality.
Despite the saccharine nature of many of our culture’s Christmas practices, Advent is not a time for sugarcoating the reality of our world or the reality of our feelings or the states of our hearts. It is a season for honesty, and it is in this honesty that we can find the true joy that Jesus wants to give us in this season. A joy that is not built on reindeer, snowmen, Christmas trees, pretense, or pageantry, but a joy that is grounded in an authentic relationship with God where we can wrestle truthfully with the state of the world and with the state of our hearts. A joy that is built upon God’s loving faithfulness and His promises to make all things new - realities that remain true no matter what the states of our hearts and feelings are.
In this season, we are reminded that God so loved the world that He created it in the first place, and then when people walked away in sin, He called out a special nation, Israel, to be a blessing to all nations.
In this season, we are reminded that when Israel failed to fully live up to its call, God so loved the world that He raised up a shoot out of the stump of Jesse; this shoot was Jesus. This Jesus, the Messiah, the Second Person of the Trinity, was God in flesh who came to this world out of love, ultimately died and was raised from the dead for love of the world, and then sent love and joy into our hearts when he gave the Holy Spirit to those who believed.
In this season, we are reminded that it is this same Jesus who will one day return and renew all things because He so loves the world.
It is because of this steadfast love and faithfulness that God has shown his people over thousands of years that we are able to hold out true hope during this season, and it is through this hope, coupled with our ability to be honest before the Lord with all our emotions and responses to the world around us, that we can develop a true and deep and abiding joy in this season. This is why I love Advent, and this is why I hope you do too.
Welcome to Advent. May you experience true joy!
Spiritual Practices to Foster Joy During This Season
While it is definitely not the pageantry of this season that brings true joy, nevertheless there are some practices that we as individuals and the church as a whole can embrace, which can help to foster this joy during this season. Here are some brief explanations of some very common Advent practices.
The Color Purple
In liturgical churches, the color purple symbolizes preparation and penitence, so you will see the color purple being used in our church and in many others during the season of Advent. The color reminds us that as we wait for Jesus to come again and to judge the world with righteousness and truth, we are called to prepare to meet the Lord, and that means looking into our hearts and asking God for transformation and renewal. As the traditional first Sunday in Advent Collect says,
Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility.
So as we come into our worship space each week and go about our lives during the rest of the week, we are called to find spaces of self-reflection. Let the color purple remind us of this, for only as we are real with ourselves and real with the Lord can we find that deep and abiding joy that God would like to give to us.
Advent Groups, Quiet Days, and Quiet Times
Each Advent, churches usually set aside some time for quiet days, retreats, reflection, and prayer. This year, our church is setting apart time on Wednesdays and alternating Sundays. In the busyness of the season, it can be difficult for us to focus on the true meaning of Advent. With this in mind, we purposely set aside time for silence, prayer, reflection of Advent Scriptures and music, and conversation with God and each other. We do this so that we might hear from God and live more fully into this season.
We also encourage each one of us to create space in our own days and weeks to find this time to be alone with God – to just “be” with the Lord - to express our laments and frustrations, to give voice to our longings and hopes, to get in touch with our hearts, to make space for self-reflection, and to reflect upon and rejoice in God’s faithfulness.
The Advent Wreath, Advent Spiral, and Christmas Lights
The traditional Advent wreath is in a circle, which symbolizes God’s eternity. Each Sunday in Advent, we light a new candle. This progressive lighting represents the great Light has dawned in the land of darkness (Isaiah 9). It symbolizes our hope and our waiting for the coming of Christ – both for the celebration of His birth and His Second Coming. Three of the candles are in the traditional penitential purple, but the fourth candle, which we light on the third week, is pink and represents joy. All of the candles symbolize one of the virtues that God awakens in us: hope, love, joy, and peace. As for the middle candle which is white, it is the Christ candle, which is lit on Christmas Eve and symbolizes that the Light of the World has come.
In recent years, some people have also taken up lighting an Advent spiral. Instead of lighting a candle each Sunday, one lights a candle each day in December. The progressive lighting marks time just as an Advent Calendar does and again reminds us of Jesus, the Light that is dawning in the darkness of our world. The lighting of the candle often corresponds with our time for daily prayer and devotions, either as a family or as an individual.
Much like the candles we light on Advent wreaths, the lights we put up on our trees and our houses also represent the Light of Jesus coming into this world of darkness.
So as we light the candles in our Advent wreaths at church and at home this year or as we appreciate the Christmas lights all around us, let us remember Jesus the true Light of the World who is the source of our salvation and joy.
Lessons and Carols
The Anglican Lessons and Carols Service is a traditional service that churches hold sometime in December. While our church won’t be hosting one this year, I know that some of us will be attending these services elsewhere. What is the purpose of this service? Well, as the name suggests, it is simply a service of reading Scriptures and singing Advent (and maybe a few Christmas) carols. The Scriptures and music take us through Creation, Fall, the Call of Israel, the Waiting for a Messiah, and the pregnancy of Mary (and all the other wondrous events that go with that). Through that service, we are reminded of God’s faithfulness over the millennia as we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus and as we wait for Jesus to come again to bring peace and justice into this world.
The Jesse Tree
The Jesse tree serves a similar purpose as the Lessons and Carols but it is generally a practice that is done at home with the family. Each day, usually starting on December 1st, children and adults with child-like imaginations read an Old Testament story and hang an ornament on a Jesse tree, which symbolizes the shoot that arose out of the stump of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1), which of course was Jesus. Like the Lessons and Carols, the Scriptures take us through Creation, Fall, the Call of Israel, the Waiting for the Messiah, and the pregnancy of Mary, but it covers more of the Old Testament since there are 25 days to reflect on these stories of God’s faithfulness throughout time. As we reflect on this faithfulness, the true joy of the season arises in our hearts as we remember God’s love and promises.
Why We NEED Advent
A few years ago, comedian Louis CK performed a hilarious cultural critique called “Everything’s Amazing and Nobody’s Happy.” His general premise was that contemporary Americans enjoy luxuries and technological advancements unprecedented in the history of the world, yet far from enjoying these amenities, we spend most of our time complaining about them. To illustrate his point, CK talked about our frustration with phones when they drop calls or take a few moments to connect. He impersonated a twenty-something staring angrily at their device, screaming aloud, “It won’t…It won’t…UGH!”
“GIVE IT A SECOND!” CK responds, “IT’S GOING TO SPACE! GIVE IT A SECOND TO GET BACK FROM SPACE!”
CK’s monologue is hilarious because we all know how true it is. We’ve all experienced frustration or even rage at things that make life SO MUCH MORE CONVENIENT for us today than it was for people 100+ years ago. Ever been annoyed when your wifi goes out at a coffee shop or in your home? Yeah, you know what I’m talking about! We’ve grown accustomed to everything working for us instantly. So much so, that when it doesn’t, we feel that the universe has offended against us.
Perhaps this is why so many of us find the idea of relating to God so frustrating, anger-inducing, uncomfortable, or weird. God, if we even think He exists, is rarely experienced by any of us as convenient or instantly and always giving us what we want. When this looks like God failing to help us win the lottery, that’s an offense of His that most of us are willing to get over. But when it comes to our angry, lonely, suicidal, rubber-bullet-on-refugee firing, school-shooting-up, opioid-addicted, hate-crime-committing world, the fact that God doesn’t seem to be doing anything to actively fix these matters when He’s supposed to be both good AND all-powerful, is usually enough to make us either not believe in Him or hate His guts.
And these reactions are only felt by the most honest and reflective of us. More often today, we don’t spend enough time sitting with our painful emotions to even KNOW what we’re feeling, why we’re feeling it, and who we’re blaming. Instead, we resort to entertainment, addictions, or distractions: anything we can turn to that’s loud enough to pull our attention away from the deepest darkest things that are robbing our joy, fueling our anxiety, and causing us to doubt—if we’re honest—that life is really worth living.
This is why we NEED Advent.
Advent is the first season in the Christian church calendar. It is the approximately 4-week-long season leading up to Christmas, during which Christians throughout history have made space in their lives to attend to their own hearts, and to acknowledge where they are frustrated, discouraged, and painfully WAITING for God to show up and do something in their lives. It is also the space where Christians throughout history have re-anchored their lives in the great story of the God revealed in Jesus Christ: the God who once came into our world as a fragile Middle-Eastern baby, who was crucified, and who, Christians believe rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and will one day RETURN to end pain and suffering, destroy death, establish complete justice, and wipe every tear from every eye. For these reasons, Advent is also a season of hope. To us, a people who live in a land of deep darkness, light has shined, it is shining, and in Jesus, one day, it will WIN. Advent reminds us that the hope extended to our world is that in Jesus, we are waiting on something better than just good immigration laws or gun violence mitigation strategies (though working toward these things is good and important). We are waiting on the total healing and transformation of our world. In this story and with this God, we have space to honestly name and forcefully express all of our sorrow and anguish. And then we are invited to spend time with a God who hears us and promises that He will one day make all of these things well. Jesus came into our world once as a man so He could fully understand what we feel when we suffer, and He will come back into the world with power strong enough to end all suffering and dispel all darkness.
Black Friday and the Holiday Season commercial machine teaches us to ignore and RUN from our pain, to feast on the cotton candy of nostalgia. But the best that all of this can offer is false hope that will, in the end, leave us empty. Jesus, the real Christmas story, and the journey of Advent invite us not to RUN, but to WAIT: to sit with God’s people throughout history as we have all waited on the healing of our hearts and the fixing of our world. To recognize the depth of our need, and to feast on the presence of the only ONE who can meet us in our darkness and do something about it.
This year, don’t run from your pain. Don’t bury your hope. WAIT. Wait with the people of God for healing and transformation. Make space to hear the story of God, the promises of Jesus, the hope of the Gospel. Feast on the One who is real, who can satisfy you, who can give you light to dispel the darkness.
New to Advent? Looking for a community to enter into this special season with? We’d love to invite you to join us at The Mission Cincinnati for any of our worship services, every Sunday from now through December 23rd at 10 AM at the Evanston Recreation Center (3204 Woodburn Ave. Cincinnati OH 45207). Every service will include beautiful music, passionate singing, space for prayer and reflection, inspirational teaching from the Bible, and a celebration of communion. We have a nursery for infants and toddlers and a Mission Kids ministry for children ages 4-10 featuring The Gospel Project curriculum. We will also have two contemplative Mission Communities hosted by Rev. Kristen Yates in her home on Sunday afternoons at 4 PM (12/2 & 12/16) and every Wednesday evening at 6:30 PM. You can contact Kristen at kristen@missioncincinnati.org for address info if you’d like to attend. These spaces will offer yummy snacks, silence, contemplative prayer, and a chance to meet other folks on a spiritual journey.
We can’t wait to meet you this season! Praying that you would experience the fullness of Christ’s presence, power, and love in these days!
Grace, peace, and blessings from our team here at The Mission Cincinnati as we wait on the world to change together!
Giving Thanks & Giving Tuesday
I was sitting at a table a month ago across from a pastor who had grown up in India and who had recently moved to America.
“You have NO RELATIONSHIPS in this country,” he said.
He unpacked this statement with many examples, two of which had to do with families. In his collectivist culture, elders move in with their children in old age, and children rejoice in the provision of their parents for education, weddings, etc. In OUR individualist culture, he observed, parents are shamed for depending on their children in old age, and move into retirement homes by themselves. Children are shamed for relying on their parents to pay for college, and work multiple jobs or take out loans to avoid having to ask. As a result, we do not know each other because we have pursued every possible option other than the interdependence that would fuel increased connection.
As we approach Thanksgiving and Giving Tuesday, and in light of this pastor’s cultural observations, it is interesting to reflect on Jesus’s words recorded in Acts 20:35 that “it is more blessed to give than to receive.” It seems to me that all genuine and healthy relationships are marked by GENEROSITY. Friends speak and act kindly to one another, not out of obligation, but out of a simple desire to. Spouses, at their best, love, serve, and sacrifice for each other not because they have to, but because they want to. This goodness of relationship is characterized by a heart that overflows with generous love toward another. Our open-handed, joyful, other-loving generosity builds trust, encourages reciprocity, expresses grace, and all of this BUILDS RELATIONSHIPS.
Our divided world so desperately needs more healthy and functional relationships. Our cities and neighborhoods are suffering not just from material poverty, but from relational poverty as well. We don’t know each other, and therefore, we don’t help each other, and those with needs are disconnected from those with the resources to help. Likewise those with the resources to help don’t know those in need or where to give or how to serve, and as a result we are left in lonely silos, just like my pastor friend observed. We need each other. And perhaps generosity is the key to building these relationships that could repair our world and heal our loneliness.
At The Mission Cincinnati, alleviating relational poverty is one of our central goals. We are blessed to be in relationship with many other ministry partners across our city and country. As we prepare for Giving Tuesday, we wanted to take a few days to highlight some of these ministry partners, so that you can get to know them too, so that you can give to support their needs, and so that as a result, you can build new relationships strengthened by generosity. So over the coming weeks, make sure to stay tuned to our Facebook page as we share stories and needs from some of our partner organizations. Maybe one or two will touch your heart and God will lead you to give to support their work. And maybe as a result you will build a relationship, make a friend, step into service and experience the truth of Christ’s words that it really is more blessed to give than to receive!
What FASCINATES YOU?
What FASCINATES you?
In case you’re curious as to what specifically I mean, I classify as fascinating those things that irresistibly draw my attention and interest.
I’ve had a lot of fascinations in my life. As a kid I was fascinated by space. I loved the Star Trek movies, reading coffee-table-sized books about the planets and the universe and the science of stars, building spaceships out of LEGOs and LOVING watching that alien space ship blow up the Empire State Building in Independence Day.
Later on in elementary school, I was fascinated by skyscrapers, then by America’s roller coasters, then by outdoor expeditions, especially the most terrifying climbs on the world’s tallest mountains.
Being fascinated is a great emotional experience. It’s exciting, even energizing. To live a fascinated life is to spend your time on the edge of your seat. To feel connected. To share something.
Fascination also seems to be the opposite of fear.
When we are afraid of something or someone, we pull away, but when we’re fascinated, we draw close.
I’m worried that our world seems filled up with increasing amounts of fear. We’re afraid of the economy and how it will affect our retirement or our job security. We’re afraid of technology and how it’s changing our brains. We’re afraid of our President’s Twitter feed and how it might affect North Korea’s bombs. We’re afraid of the increasing number of school shootings and what that means about our society. We’re afraid of our kids growing up and moving out into a scary and unfamiliar world. We’re afraid of our parents dying, and having to ourselves become people others look to for “wisdom” in a world we no longer understand. We’re afraid of people whose skin color is different from ours, afraid of people who practice a different religion, or who identify with a different political party.
There’s so much to be afraid of that fear can take up all our time, steal all our attention, and rob all of our peace.
What if fascination is the antidote?
What if fascination is a pastime that can be practiced? A skill that can be improved upon? A spiritual discipline that can help us recover joyful space in our brains and our hearts? A tool to build friendships with people or bridges across difference so that we can get to know and love the very people who could heal our deepest pain and who, through knowing them, might dispel more and more of our fear?
What fascinates you? Wouldn’t it be fun to talk about those things and share them with others?
Come join the conversation! We want to know what fascinates you and maybe as we get to know you, share a little bit about what fascinates us!
Feel free to comment here or on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/themissioncincinnati/! More opportunities to get involved will be announced and shared soon!