Pray for the coming day, and for God’s servants who are bringing good news, healing and hope in the world, especially for ___________________________ (persons you desire to pray for).

Loving God,

You are Lord of the harvest, and Owner of the farm.

Thank you for calling _____________________ to co-labor with You in the field of this world.
Help ___________________ this day to know your voice and guidance, to be led and empowered by your Spirit, and protected from all that is against you and your work in the world. May your kingdom come, and your will be done in their life and in the lives of those they companion into your gracious love and salvation.

In the name of Jesus, Savior, Emmanuel.

Amen.

CLOSING PRAYER
Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen

Lord Jesus Christ,

You who knew the Spirit of God upon and within you, the anointing of God as you brought good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and freedom to those who are oppressed; breathe your Spirit upon ________________________ this day.

Anoint them with God’s love, power, guidance and compassion. May they know your presence and guidance as they co-labor with you to bring good news to _________________________, release from captivity, healing from blindness, and freedom from oppression.

May God’s grace and kind favor be felt and known this day.

In your great name, Amen.
(based on Isaiah 61:1-52 & Luke 4:18-19)

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen

Wake me up, dear God,
Help me.
Open the eyes of my soul;
Help me to see.
Open the ears of my heart;
Help me to hear.

I am slow in leaving the world of sleep.
Wake me up, dear God.

Be assured that God hears us, helps us.
These morning prayers are a signal of our desire,
our intent for the day to come.
They need not be long. We need not linger.
There will be another, more spacious time in which
to sink more deeply into prayer, reading and
reflection; to listening and responding.

Sheltering God, Abba Amma, you have brought us in safety
to this new day.
Keep us under the wings of your protection, that we may not lose sight
of your ways, nor what you are about this day.
Keep us steady in trust, hope, and love in the face of adversity.
And in all we do, direct us in the ways of your gracious and life-giving
purpose;
In the name of Jesus, Immanuel, God with us. Amen.

Silence

Be still.

Open your awareness to God’s presence
Within and all around.

“Be still and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10)

Lord Jesus, Shepherd who seeks,
By your Spirit, be present in our world today.
Companion those who are lost and seeking a way home,
Give light in their darkness, especially to _____________________.
Give them clarity and guidance in the fog of their restlessness.
As they ache for rest in God, lead them home to your loving and merciful Abba who yearns for their return, and waits on the front porch of the kingdom to greet them.

Shepherd me this day to be a patient listener, a hospitable companion, and a guide who helps others discover your presence and work in their lives.

In your great name, Amen

Pray the prayer Jesus taught his disciples:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial
and deliver us from evil.

For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever.

Amen.

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen

O God, You who give abundantly out of your glory,
Give us strength in our inner being.
Holy Spirit, You who indwell us,
Empower us to be strong within.
Lord Jesus Christ, You who carry out the loving purposes of God,
Make your home in our hearts;
Help us to grow in faith and trust,
As you continue to root and ground us in your love.
By your power, help us to grasp—along with all who bear your
Name—how wide and deep and long and high your love is.
Help us to know your love—which is beyond our understanding.
Fill us with all the fullness of God.
Gracious God, you who by your power within us, are able to
do abundantly more than all we can ask or imagine,
to you be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus, always, always.
Amen.

*Based on Ephesians 3:16-21

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen

Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

Our lectionary readings invite us first to listen as Paul continues to write to the believers in Galatia—offering them spiritual direction as they learn to follow the way of Jesus.
Yes, Jesus has set us free from slavery to the judgment of the law, and from slavery to sin. But this freedom does not mean we are free to do anything we please. Rather, Jesus sets us free from the clutches of sin and our old nature so that we are free to choose differently; free to listen to the guidance of the Spirit, free to love our neighbor, free to love our true self, free to love our enemy, and to express the fruit of the Spirit in our lives.

This week the lectionary readings in Luke 9 offer us an illustration of how the early followers of Jesus were being discipled by Jesus into this gospel freedom.

We enter the gospel narrative as Jesus is walking south to Jerusalem, first through Galilee and then into Samaria. The Samaritans, on hearing that Jesus was Jerusalem bound, refuse him hospitality. James and John—those “Sons of Thunder”—react in murderous anger masked under the guise of prophetic and religious zeal:

Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them as Elijah did?

On hearing their abusive question, Jesus turns toward these two brothers, and directs their attention first, away from the villagers who refused hospitality, and towards themselves and what it is that is driving them. Their anger had exploded into murderous violence. Then he directs their attention towards himself and his ways of being and doing:

You do not know what spirit you are of, for the Son of Man has not come to destroy the lives of human beings but to save them.

Alvarez de Paz, a seventeenth century spiritual guide, helps us understand what is meant when the word ‘spirit’ is used in this context: an internal impulse by which a person feels urged to do something. Throughout the scriptures and the writings in Christian spirituality this gift and work of discernment of spirits is noted as being central to the work of spiritual guidance. John—this disciple whom Jesus names a Son of Thunder– comes to recognize the internal impulses of misdirected rage, and tells the believers in one of his letters to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God” (I John 4:1). It is this kind of discernment Jesus calls James and John to make as he invites them to see their reaction of anger and vengeance in the light of who he, the Son of Man, is and what he is about. He has not come to destroy lives, but to save lives.

Following Jesus calls us to differentiate ourselves from family habits, the world view we may have been brought up with, the value systems imbedded in our culture, the impulses which drive and control how the world’s system works.

In Paul’s letter to the Galatians he invites us to notice what the fruit (inward and outward expression) of the Holy Spirit is. This helps us notice and discern the various impulses and drives within us.

Reflection
Invite the Holy Spirit to help you get in touch with various impulses in your life:

• those places where you lack love and compassion for others
• those times when anger blocks your presence for God, for yourself, others
• your frustration with “little” people, tasks, the seemingly insignificant
• your need for control
• other impulses which take over drive your life

Now reflect on the ways in which the impulses of the Holy Spirit are at play and
are influencing and leading your life (see Galatians 5:22-26)

Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

6/17 Monday: Luke 9:51-56
6/18 Tuesday: Luke 9:57-62
6/19 Wednesday: Psalm 16
6/20 Thursday: 2 Kings 2:1-2,6-14
6/21 Friday: Galatians 5:1,13-25
6/22 Saturday: Luke 9:51-56
6/23 Sunday: Luke 9:57-62

Pray for the coming day. Pray for persons, families, who need the healing and compassionate care of Jesus, especially for ___________________________ .

Dear God and Father, You who mother us with your mercy, and gentle us into peace with your consolation, console us in all our suffering and affliction So that we may be able to console those who suffer with the comfort and care we receive from you.

By your kind Spirit, be present with those who suffer and are crushed. Breathe your comfort and consolation upon the dry ground of their despair. Through your grace and saving love, surround them with your protection, give them healing and restoration.

In the name of Jesus, our Healer and Burden Bearer. Amen.

*Based on 2 Cor.1:3-5

INTERCESSION

Pray for the coming day, and for the persons whom God has called to minister and give oversight in the church, the body of Christ.

Dear God,
You are at work this day.
Help us, your servants, to pay attention to your presence
And what you are doing. Pry us loose from our own agenda,
tight schedules, strategic outcomes.
Wash the lens of our hearts, to see you –
to wait with you; to listen as you listen
to feel the gentle breeze of your Spirit breathing among persons
who sit in the shadow of death;
to speak as you give words,
to touch with gentleness; we are your hands;
to be hospitable within to your good news, and
happy in its overflow in word, touch, and being.
To see evil as you see–all that blocks, stifles, robs,
and destroys, and yet to stand in trusting hope–
in you, Lord Christ, who died to set us free from
sin’s power to rob us of life, faith, hope, and love.
Help us to love ourselves, and so in turn to love others;
to welcome the pilgrim and neighbor within our own soul,
and so not to be a stranger to ourselves, or to others,
but in offering welcome and shelter to our own hungers
we may learn the way of offering welcome and shelter
to those who are searching, hungry, sick, in prison,
alone, naked, and thirsty: for this where you dwell.
In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen

Dear God and Father, You who mother us with your mercy, and gentle us into peace with your consolation, console us in all our suffering and affliction So that we may be able to console those who suffer with the comfort and care we receive from you.

By your kind Spirit, be present with those who suffer and are crushed. Breathe your comfort and consolation upon the dry ground of their despair. Through your grace and saving love, surround them with your protection, give them healing and restoration.

In the name of Jesus, our Healer and Burden Bearer. Amen.

*Based on 2 Cor.1:3-5

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving God, Help me to hear your guidance
To listen deeply to your voice.
Awaken my mind and soul to your work
Within and among us.
Help me not to run into busy avoidance.
Bend my heart to stay . . . and to love
To walk your gracious ways in this world.
Amen