Tag: forgiveness

Prayers for Creation

7th October 2022 

The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life. Job 33:4

You Lord, are the source of all good things: 

We praise you.

You call us to tend and care for your creation: 

May we strive to do your will.

You have made us as brothers and sisters with all that lives: 

May we live together in peace.

A reading from Genesis 2: 7,15 (The Message)

God formed Man out of dirt from the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life. The Man came alive—a living soul! God took the Man and set him down in the Garden of Eden to work the ground and keep it in order.

A reading from John 20:21-23 (The Message)

 The disciples, seeing the Master with their own eyes, were awestruck. Jesus repeated his greeting: “Peace to you. Just as the Father sent me, I send you.”

Then he took a deep breath and breathed into them. “Receive the Holy Spirit,” he said. “If you forgive someone’s sins, they’re gone for good. If you don’t forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?”

A response:

Air, 

flutters in my nostrils, 

brushes my lips, 

on the tip of my tongue, 

filling my mouth

flows into my lungs – 

oxygen interchange 

recharges my blood. 

Life!

Spirit, 

flutters in my nostrils, 

brushes my lips, 

on the tip of my tongue, 

filling my mouth 

flows into my lungs – 

oxygen interchange 

recharges my soul. 

Life!

Thank you for the ever renewed gift of life.

Thank you for biology and chemistry 

and physicality. 

Thank you for heart and soul 

and imagination.

Thank you for love and faith 

and compassion.

Prayer:

Living God,

We lay before you our own sins and short comings, 

our guilt and our stupidity.

Forgive us and relieve us of our shame. 

Help us to make recompense 

for the damage we have caused, 

to rebuild our lives and those we have afflicted.

Living God, 

We lay before you our failure 

to tend and care for the earth, 

our failure tend your plants 

and care for your creatures.

Grant us time for amendment, 

to renew and  re-wild 

to reclaim and regenerate your beautiful earth.

Living God,

We lay before you the sins of our communities

and those sins which afflict our lives. 

Bestow again your forgiveness and mercy 

and enable us to be forgiving too. 

Help us to rebuild our communities, 

to bind the wounds and heal the scars,

and to renew the bonds of kinship.

Amen.

The Grace

Lent Reflection

14th April 2022

Olive Orchard mid-June 1889 Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

The olive tree – olea europaea – is an evergreen tree growing to a height of 15m, and a life span of 1000 or even 2000 years! It is a native of the Mediterranean and surrounding areas and has been cultivated here since ancient times. It is grown for its fruit and for the oil that produces; the word oil itself derives from its name – oleum in Latin and elaia in Greek. Olive oil has many uses, for cooking, lighting, cleansing and medicinal purposes, for massage and for coating the bodies of athletes in Ancient Greece. It has long been used too for sacred purposes to annoying holy people and holy places. It symbolises abundance, prosperity and peace. Olive branches were given as tokens of benediction and victory, and wreathes of olives leaves crowned the victors. Olive oil is still used for anointing baptism candidates, priests and monarchs.

On the night he was betrayed, Jesus went out to the garden of Gethsemane in the Mount of Olives to pray. Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they are doing.’ Luke 23:34a

The three most powerful resources you have available to you: love, prayer and forgiveness. 

H Jackson Brown Jr

Lent Reflection

13th April 2022

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cercis_siliquastrum#/media/File:PikiWiki_Israel_3421_Geography_of_Israel.jpg

The Judas tree – cercis siliquastrum – is a small tree, growing up to 12m whose ranges extends from Southern Europe to Western Asia. It was common in Israel, and its French name ‘arbre de Judée‘,  may give rise to its English name. Other suggestions are that it is so named because Judas hung himself on  this tree. It bears bright pink blossoms in spring which appear before its leaves, which are heart shaped. In the autumn it produces flat seed pods – the seeds themselves are poisonous. The pods are said to resemble a weaver’s shuttle, which in Greek is ‘kerkis’ which gives rise to its botanical name.

Forgive our sins, as we forgive those who sin again us. And do not let us yield to temptation. 

Luke 11.4

For there to be betrayal, there would have to have been first trust. Suzanne Collins, Hunger Games