waiting prayer for Holy Saturday

March 30, 2024April 18, 2025 / Eric Mathews / 1 Comment

Holy Saturday by Roxolana Luczakowsky via Facebook

This is the hardest time to pray:
after the drama and catastrophe,
before the angels and the big reveal.
The passion, the agony, the desperate grief
have given way to numbness
and absence
in this time in between.

God seems to be offstage,
preparing for the final scene,
taking care of ancient souls in other worlds
or clothing the hidden, broken body
in resurrection glory.

So let our prayer this day be plain
and to the point:

May God be with us in the waiting,
and may we wait with hope,
today
and every time in between.

Amen.

Kerry Greenhill, Methodist Deacon and Minister

source

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Matthew 27:57-61

As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph,

who had himself become a disciple of Jesus.

Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him.

Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth,

and placed it in his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock.

He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away.

Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were sitting there opposite the tomb.

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to become people of your light

January 5, 2024June 14, 2025 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

Adorazione dei Magi by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo via Wikimedia Commons

On Epiphany day,
we are still the people walking.
We are still people in the dark,
and the darkness looms large around us,
beset as we are by fear,
anxiety,
brutality,
violence,
loss —
a dozen alienations that we cannot manage.

We are — we could be — people of your light.
So we pray for the light of your glorious presence
as we wait for your appearing;
we pray for the light of your wondrous grace
as we exhaust our coping capacity;
we pray for your gift of newness that
will override our weariness;
we pray that we may see and know and hear and trust
in your good rule.

That we may have energy, courage, and freedom to enact
your rule through the demands of this day.
We submit our day to you and to your rule,

with deep joy and high hope.

Walter Brueggemann, 1933 – 2025, American Protestant Old Testament theologian
Prayers for a Privileged People

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Matthew 2:9-11

After this interview the wise men went their way.

And the star they had seen in the east guided them to Bethlehem.

It went ahead of them and stopped over the place where the child was.

When they saw the star, they were filled with joy!

They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary,

and they bowed down and worshiped him.

Then they opened their treasure chests

and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Advent light

December 22, 2023December 21, 2023 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

image

Sovereign Lord,

We thank you for being our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace.

In the fullness of time you, the Word, became flesh and dwelt among us …

full of grace and truth.

Open our eyes to the great significance of the Incarnation,

for you have visited and redeemed your people.

You have tented among us.

You have come that we might have life!

O Come, Thou Day-Spring,

Come and cheer our spirits by thine advent here,

And drive away the shades of night,

And pierce the clouds and bring us light.

Yes, Lord, pierce the clouds that dim our trust in you:

the clouds of grief,

the clouds of loss,

the clouds of disappointment,

the clouds that make us wonder in our difficulties,

Where are you?

O blessed Savior, light of my life,

Holy Ghost, with light divine,

Shine upon this heart of mine.

Chase the shades of night away,

Turn my darkness into day.

In doing this, Lord, I ask that you enable me

to henceforth walk in the light.

Sun of Righteousness, we do not yet know what we shall be,

but we do believe that when Jesus shall appear,

we shall be like him.

So in between these two Advents,

may our longing,

our expectation,

our hope in him

make us pure even as he is pure.

We pray in Jesus’ name.

Wendell C. Hawley, American pastor

A Pastor Prays for this People

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Isaiah 9:2

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;

those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.

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O comforting fire of Spirit

May 30, 2023May 29, 2023 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

Pentecost: Descent of the Holy Spirit, French Mid-12th Century, CC BY-SA 2.0

O comforting fire of Spirit,
Life, within the very Life of all Creation.
Holy you are in giving life to All.

Holy you are in anointing
those who are not whole;
Holy you are in cleansing
a festering wound.

O sacred breath,
O fire of love,
O sweetest taste in my breast
which fills my heart
with a fine aroma of virtues.

O most pure fountain
through whom it is known
that God has united strangers
and inquired after the lost.

O breastplate of life
and hope of uniting
all members as One,
O sword-belt of honor,
enfold those who offer blessing.

Care for those
who are imprisoned by the enemy
and dissolve the bonds of those
whom Divinity wishes to save.

O mightiest path which penetrates All,
from the height to every Earthly abyss,
you compose All, you unite All.

Through you clouds stream, ether flies,
stones gain moisture,
waters become streams,
and the earth exudes Life.

You always draw out knowledge,
bringing joy through Wisdom’s inspiration.

Therefore, praise be to you
who are the sound of praise
and the greatest prize of Life,
who are hope and richest honor
bequeathing the reward of Light.

St. Hildegard of Bingen, 1098 – 1179, German, composer, Benedictine abbess

source

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Titus 3:4-7

But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us,

not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy.

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,

he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior,

so that, having been justified by his grace,

we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

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You are . . .

April 28, 2023April 27, 2023 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

photo by Mario La Pergola on Unsplash

You alone are holy, Lord God, Worker of Wonders.

You are mighty. You are great. You are the Most High.

You are omnipotent, our holy Father, King of heaven and earth.

You, Lord God, three in one, are our every good.

You, Lord God, all good, our highest good – Lord God living and true.

You are charity and love.

You are wisdom. You are humility.

You are patience.

You are security. You are peace.

You are joy and gladness.

You are justice and temperance.

You are riches altogether sufficient.

You are beauty. You are meekness.

You are our refreshment.

You are our hope. You are our faith.

You are our most profound sweetness.

You are our eternal life, great and admirable Lord,

omnipotent God, merciful Savior!

Carlo Carretto, 1910 – 1988, Italian writer and minister

Prayers for Today

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Romans 11:33-36

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!

How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!
“For who has known the mind of the Lord,
or who has been his counselor?”
“Or who has given a gift to him
that he might be repaid?”
For from him and through him and to him are all things.

To him be glory forever. Amen.

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Forgiveness and Hope

April 21, 2023April 20, 2023 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

Christ is Risen, Lawrence OP, Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Our God, whose Son is the light of the world,

in his penetrating light, we acknowledge our darkness;

in his constant grace, our careless love;

in his generous giving, our sordid grasping;

in his equal justice, our dire prejudice;

in his fortitude, our fearful failure;

in his inclusive love, our deep divisions;

in his pure sacrifice, our soiling sins.

But in his Cross is our forgiveness,

and in his resurrection our enduring hope.

This pardon and the promise we now claim,

in penitence and faith, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Horton Davies, 1916-2005, Professor of Religion Princeton University

The Communion of Saints

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Romans 8:10-11

And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin,

the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God.

The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you.

And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead,

he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.

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The Church should be a verb

February 10, 2023February 13, 2023 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash

Granted, it’s a tough assignment, the original assignment. I get that.

Love – Lord help us, could we not have been assigned something easier,

like astrophysics or quantum mechanics?

But no – love those you cannot love.

Love those who are poor and broken and fouled and dirty

and sick with sores.

Love those who wish to strike you on both cheeks.

Love the blowhard, the pompous ass, the arrogant liar.

Find the Christ in each heart, even those.

Preach the Gospel and only if necessary talk about it.

Be the Word.

It is easy to advise and pronounce and counsel

and suggest and lecture;

it is not easy to do what must be done

without sometimes shrieking.

Bring love like a bright weapon against the dark.

The Rabbi did not say build churches, or retreat houses,

or secure a fleet of cars for general use, or convene conferences,

or issue position papers.

He was pretty blunt about the hungry and the naked and the sick.

He was not reasonable; we forget this.

The Church is not a reasonable idea.

The Church should be a verb.

When it is only a noun it is not what the Founder asked of us.

Let us pray that we are ever after dissolving

the formal officious arrogant thing that wants to rise,

and ever fomenting the contradictory revolutionary

countercultural thing that could change life on this planet.

It could, you know.

Let’s try again today.

And so: Amen.

Brian Doyle, 1956 – 2017, Catholic author from Oregon

A Book of Uncommon Prayer

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Ephesians 1:22-23

God has put all things under the authority of Christ

and has made him head over all things for the benefit of the church.

And the church is his body; it is made full and complete by Christ,

who fills all things everywhere with himself.

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how do I worship in spirit?

August 18, 2022August 17, 2022 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

O God, what is Spirit?

How do I worship in spirit and in truth?

I am such a solid, earthly creature,

my feet planted firmly on the ground,

my life based upon material things.

I like to touch and feel and see before I believe.

I am accustomed to dealing with houses, land, and money,

with bread, meat and potatoes,

with objects handled, weighed, and valued

by my own standards.

I am uncomfortable with what cannot be analyzed

or dissected or given a market value.

What is Spirit?

Yet, O Lord, the very things I handle and see

lose meaning when they become ends in themselves.

They are all given meaning by the things of the spirit,

by love and hope and faith.

I know when I come down to it,

if I have all kinds of earthly goods

and have not love,

I have nothing.

I need the mystery beyond the tangible.

I need the things of the spirit

to give meaning to the material things I prize.

I cannot divide life up,

you have made it whole.

If I avoid love, diminish hope, deny faith,

my appreciation of my house and land,

my meat and potatoes, shrinks,

And I become a little man

with little aims and little power.

Kenneth Phifer

A Book of Uncommon Prayer

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John 4:23-24

But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—

when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth.

The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way.

For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.

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for those involved with the law

July 14, 2022July 13, 2022 / Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

_{Jesus Before Pilate, James Tissot, Wikipedia Commons}

Lord Jesus,

You were in prison, found guilty when you were innocent,

You were executed as traitor when in fact you were Savior.

To you who died to set all free we pray for:

All makers of the laws of the land,

that they do so with reason and compassion.

All interpreters of the law – judges, lawyers –

that they be fair, honest and impartial.

All administrators of the law – prison guards and superintendents –

that they be merciful in their firmness.

All prisoners – that they may know that you are in prison with them,

in their homes with their loved ones,

and that in you is their hope.

Though bound, may they be perfectly free in you and in your service.

John B. Coburn, 1914- 2009, Bishop of Massachusetts

The Communion of Saints

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Psalm 146:5-8

Blessed are those whose help is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the Lord their God.
He is the Maker of heaven and earth,
the sea, and everything in them—
he remains faithful forever.
He upholds the cause of the oppressed
and gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets prisoners free,
the Lord gives sight to the blind,
the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down,
the Lord loves the righteous.

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