Each morning I read one of the psalms from the daily lectionary. I love to read them in a variety of translations. Yesterday it was Psalm 50:1 from The Voice that held my attention. As you know I love to take photographs of sunrise and sunset and so it is not surprising that the words of this verse resonated in my soul throughout the day conjuring up images of the many glorious sunrises and sunsets I have witnessed.
What verse resonates in your soul today? What images of God’s world does it bring to mind? Take a photo, write a prayer or poem, draw a picture or use some other creative arts to express your response.
Each year I post prayers from some of my favourite saints ancient and modern throughout the season of Lent. I will continue to do that but thought that some would like to have access to these prayers in one easy step so that you can plan your own use of them during the season.
- Lenten Prayers by St Augustine of Hippo
- Do It Anyway – A Lenten Prayer by Mother Teresa
- Prayers for Creation by John Birch
- Prayers from Teresa of Avila for Lent
- A Lenten Prayer by Thomas A Kempis
- Christ Has Walked this Path – Lenten Video by Jeff Johnson
- Morning and Evening Prayers for Lent
- Fall In Love – A Prayer for Lent by Father Pedro Arrupe
- The Lord’s Prayer – An Adaptation
- Prayers for Lent by Desmond Tutu
- I Cannot Do This Alone – A Lenten Prayer by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
- Thomas Merton’s Most Famous Prayer – A Good Prayer for Lent
- I Choose To Breathe in the Breath of Christ – A Prayer by Joseph Tetlow
- A Prayer fo Lent by Cesar Chavez
- A Lenten Prayer for Creation
- Columba’s Prayer – Helping Me Through Lent
- The Prayer of St Brendan
- Brigit’s Feast – My Favourite Celtic Prayer
- A Prayer for the First Sunday of Lent
Please check out our complete list of Godspace resources for Lent through Holy Week
Circle prayer doodle – Joyce Withrow
Last week, you may remember, I posted this Celtic prayer. It is one of many that I have posted over the years, my favourites being God Circle Me and Circle Us Lord. I love these prayers and write them regularly as a part of my own spiritual observances.
What interested me was the response to my latest prayer. Joyce Withrow drew the beautiful doodle above and Susan Gibson sent me this photo of her inspiring meditation.
Susan Gibson – circle prayer art
Circles were significant to the Celts and it is not surprising that circling prayers or CAIM became an important part of their prayer life.
It was felt that a circle with no break was a complete whole affording no access to the devil. Monasteries were often built with a circle of crosses surrounding them declaring that the space with in was sacred and different – dedicated to God and claimed as a place where God met people who were offered sanctuary and hospitality.
The Celtic cross with its circle at the heart of the cross drew on significance of the sun as the source of heat and light, reminding people of the nimbus or halo that artists used to signify the white heat of pure holiness. (from The Celtic Resource Book – Martin Wallace)
Sometimes prayers would be said with the drawing of an imaginary circle around the people or place being prayed for. At other times an actual circle path was created around a room, a building or community and the circling prayer recited as people walked a mini pilgrimage around the area. This is a highly effective form of prayer to use for a house blessing, or as a prayer for protection, or as a prayer for spiritual strength.
Watch the delightful video below of how a child uses a simple circling prayer to cast out fear on his first day at school. Then consider ways to use your own circling prayers. What are you afraid of, our anxious about? Where are places that you feel need a special circle of God’s love? I encourage you to create your own circling prayers or to use the prayers linked in this post as a framework for meditation and contemplation. I think that you too will find this an inspiring spiritual exercise too – and I would love to hear where your inspiration leads you.
‘They’ say bad habits can be changed in 21 days. I don’t think that is true for me. There are times I barely make it through the first day. I think maybe science needed to listen more to God.
Approaching Lent this year, I think of the 40 day periods mentioned so often in the Bible. Is it maybe that a mere three weeks seems so short in today’s busy world that we think, “f it doesn’t work, it is easy to stop and just start over?” I don’t know.
I do know that when I consider giving anything up for 40 days dedicated to God, I take it more seriously.
Those who have studied this number say God used it to impress upon us our times of trouble and hardship. I could make that sound religious, as if God sent me the trials of my life, but notice that in the Bible, just as with my own times of trouble and hardship, more often than not, these were notably bought on, by those suffering, themselves. Rather cuts down on the moaning and groaning of “poor pity me” when I consider that.
During the mighty flood, 40 days and nights of rain destroyed much of the world, God created and loved, with flooding because of the evil and disobedience in the world at that time. That it only took 40 days to obliterate all I see is rather intimidating. But then comes the promise I remember every time I see a rainbow. It makes me believe that though his power can wipe out the entire planet, his desire is always to make it beautiful for us.
Since the time of that promise 40 days (and at times years!), it seems to me, is used as a teaching tool to give us time to improve our lives: to show us it takes time. Father teach me I must use the time, you allow me, to learn patiently. May I seek not the achievement of the goal as much as the lessons learned on the journey.
Moses fled to the desert for nearly 40 years after killing the Egyptian in response to seeing his true countrymen abused. Seems to me that being Egyptian royalty he might have assumed he could expect to avoid punishment. However, ‘something’ moved him to tend sheep in Midian for all those years in preparation for what was to come.
When Moses climbed Mount Sinai, after entering the midst of the holy cloud, he remained there for 40 days and nights listening to and learning from God. Oh Lord, would I would be lost in that learning for my life’s good, so intensely that time no longer mattered.
After descending the mount with the tablets, again the people had lost patience and decided an idol of their own making would be more useful. Moses, in his distress, falls to his knees and for 40 days and nights fasted from all food and water, praying the people would not be destroyed for their foolish ways again, as with the flood. Even though he had smashed the tablets, that held the Commandments/life lessons sent by God for the people, when his days of praying and fasting were ended: God returned to the lesson. Interesting that both the time with God and the time spent praying for his mercy and grace were equal.
That these two periods of 40 days and nights were held within the 40 years of roaming the desert seems significant to me, at this time. In fact, to them we must add the 40 days the spies spent scoping out the Promised Land and then refused to enter. We humans are not prone to learning or trusting our lessons of the past easily, it would seem.
Goliath was allowed to belittle Saul’s army for 40 days before David arrived to end the standoff. After Jonah ran from God’s request, he, like Moses, eventually had to return to the original message—the lesson. The people of Nineveh were given 40 days to learn and practice the lessons and it seems they did. Yet their success angered Jonah.
Lord let me not forget my own inadequacies when viewing the success of others, but let me search only to excel in the lessons you have for me.
Jesus’ temptation by the devil in the desert was allowed to last for 40 days and nights. God’s own son had to endure such! Why should I, the adopted child, expect a life without challenges? I think of all the times I have refused the lessons, even been angry with God for daring to allow me to hurt after giving in to the temptations in my life. Who do I imagine myself to be, Lord?
The disciples were given an extra 40 days between resurrection and ascension to reflect upon their time with Jesus, to learn new lessons and establish his church. Even then, the Spirit was given to us all so that we would always have ready guidance. If only we would turn from the temptations to trust ourselves alone and to ask for Divine help.
What is the meaning of these 40 days of Lent? Am I meant to simply choose on my own to give up chocolate and then pat myself on the back as I pick it back up on the 41st day?
Father, please allow me to use this period of 40 days to surrender those parts of my life that still misuse the free will you so graciously have given me to choose. Prompt me to ask you what those are that most greatly offend you. May I choose carefully my commitments to you, not just during Lent but always, willing to make the lessons, I learn from surrendering these things, the work of a lifetime. May I be wise enough to use this time to serve others, to better serve you.
Teach me to consider these 40 days of Lent, like the 40 years in the desert, not to be some temporary period of ‘suffering’ but as a time of great learning. May I consider them as more an admonition to be better than the counting of days, just as Jesus spoke to Peter about forgiveness. He told him to forgive not seven times but 70 times seven. Didn’t that message mean we shouldn’t be counting in the first place?
Forgiveness seems a good place to start. May I forgive those for whom I hold any animosity and may I not pick it up again. May I place a greater importance on what you hold important and use these 40 days to begin the conscious process of real change in my life. I can’t do it alone. Use those, you have put in my life, with similar longings, as mutual support and mentors for the journey. May I begin each of these 40 days with you as my hope and strength for the future.
Beloved, hold me close each day that I may show your light to the world through Lent and beyond. Amen.
My morning prayer takes place in our garden room which looks out over our garden through a wall of glass held by large oak beams. During Advent my usual chair had been moved to face the glass/garden to accommodate a large Christmas tree. On the first morning of Advent I sat down as usual with a cup of tea, my daily missal and a new Richard Rohr book for Advent. I looked out into the pitch black early morning and saw hanging in the sky above the Annexe at the bottom of our garden a huge star. No ordinary star but one of seven points that looked exactly like those in a children’s story book. I was dazzled. As I looked in awe, I saw with my own eye the star explode and scatter in every direction what appeared like silver dust and then reform to it’s magnificent original shape. No telescope or binoculars needed to witness this extraordinary event which repeated several times, one after another. I reached for my phone to try and record this moment of fabulousness in a photo. The picture was abysmal and I quickly realised that this beautiful piece of stellar activity could only be stored in my own memory. My heart repeated over and over ‘awesome God, praise you God’ and my prayer that morning focused almost entirely on the wonder and mystery of the God I worship. A particular line of scripture resounded in my mind
‘…and then He made the stars.’ An almost throw away line in the Creation account of Genesis which captures my imagination to envision a God who filled the night sky with these heavenly lanterns. I can only think WOW.
Each new morning of Advent saw the star waiting for me in an inky pre-dawn sky and I was totally fascinated by it and curious as to God’s purpose in allowing me this momentous experience. I read in Richard Rohr about a Cosmic Christ and I felt a special communion between God, myself and another servant of Christ all knitted together by the heavens and in particular, a star. I also found myself looking at the three kings with new understanding and how absolutely compelling their star must have been. Not unlike the one I shared my prayer time with right now, it rendered me silent without need of words to commune with God, simply eyes raised up and a heart swelling at the sight of it.
I woke later on Christmas morning with my family and of course daylight had hidden the star from view. I opened a gift from a girlfriend and inside the wrapping a star shaped box with the words ‘The Star’ printed in gold. It contained a small bottle of oil with the words ‘inner strength’ written across the label. Once again I felt God at work – moving people, things and experiences into my path with a divine purpose that I neither understood nor needed to understand. The mystery of it all was enough. Threads, connections, union across countryside, continents and cosmos.
On 12th January my son was preparing to leave for a posting to Bahrain with the Navy as a diver. He would be away for 6 months and had to leave in the early hours to be at Brize Norton by 4am. He assured me I didn’t need to get up to see him off. I, on the other hand, felt it to be essential to put my arms around him and plant a kiss on his cheek before he left for distant shores. As I marched down the garden in pyjamas and slippers to the Annexe to hug my boy, I happened to look up and found myself standing beneath a velvet sky so heavy and glittering with stars, it took my breath away. They hung so low above me I felt I could reach out and touch them. I felt once again God’s full presence in that instant. We made our good-byes under that sky and afterwards I stood alone, appreciating personally Mrs Morel’s experience in Sons and Lovers, a paragraph I have always adored for it’s passionate lyrical description. More connections asserting themselves, between past and present, literary genius and physical experience, memory and real life, mother and son, me, God and the universe. All intertwined, interconnected but completely separate. It felt as though I was present in the whole of eternity from beginning to end. God offered a moment in a ‘thin place’ where the whole of everything existed in a single flicker of time.
Our priest has spoken of the guiding star on the celebration of the Epiphany at Mass and I listened intently to his words about the 3 kings representing the whole of God’s gentile children – Jesus for all mankind, just as the shepherds symbolised His chosen people, Israel. I have learned that a hectogram, a seven pointed star has been used in Christianity to represent the 7 days of Creation and is the symbol of perfection for God in many Christian religions. Recently the media has been filled with the news of David Bowie’s death, the lyrics of Starman have played themselves out to me: ‘There’s a star man waiting in the sky, he’d like to come and meet us but he thinks he’d blow our minds…….’ Stars, stars and more stars……
Are we ready to meet with the creator of the stars, of the universe? Am I ready? This part of my journey in faith is not over, we are only half way through January and right at the start of the church year, but already I feel completely overwhelmed by the breadth and intensity of a God imprinting Himself upon me as I am soft wax to His creative hand. Lift up your eyes to the night sky and breath in the heavens of a holy God. Look, wait, listen for your own connections and don’t be surprised if they are written in the stars. If there is any God purpose in all of this at all then I believe it is that we are all connected intrinsically and intimately through all eternity. We are part of His story.
At our MSA team meeting last Friday I was taken to task by one of my colleagues for saying that one of my goals here on Godspace is to give voice to those who have no voice. All people have a voice, he reminded me. We don’t need to give them voices, we need to learn to listen to what they say and allow it to reshape our faith. He is right.
In Globalizing Theology: Belief and Practice in an Era of World Christianity, we are reminded that “Christianity is increasingly at home in many cultures and will not be imprisoned by a single culture.” Christianity has become a world religion not because everyone worships God in the same way, but because everyone worships the same God in their own culturally specific way. “Christianity is a world religion because it is a local religion”. The wonder of Christianity is that it is adaptable to any culture. It is at its strongest not when we all think and worship in the same way but when we all bring the diversity of our cultural expressions of faith to worship God together in unity and respect in spite of our diversity.
What many Westerners are oblivious to is how much our theology is shaped by a Eurocentric viewpoint that arises from the place of power and privilege that our cultures have held for so long. We are also oblivious to how strongly we have excluded other theological perspectives, wanting to invite others to sit at our table and adopt our Christian cultural viewpoint rather than allowing them to invite us to create a new global Christian table together.
In a post colonial, post Eurocentric Christian world those of us from European backgrounds need to become good listeners and learners and learn to ask questions rather than provide answers. We also need to allow the theological perspectives of other cultures to shape our theology, humbly seeking forgiveness for the wrongs of the past and working for reconciliation and justice.
What is your response?
How do you feel we have imprisoned Christianity in Western culture and taken advantage of our power and privilege? Think about your own Christian worldview. how much of it has been shaped by people of other cultures, ethnicities and viewpoints? How willing are you to engage in theological discussions with those who see Jesus differently and grapple with the possibility that your world view needs to be reshaped by them?
In Foolishness to the Greeks, Lesslie Newbigin states:
The fact that Jesus is much more than, much greater than our culture-bound vision of him, can only come home to us through the witness of those who see him through other eyes.
It is twenty years now since I first read Lesslie Newbigin’s books and was challenged to read African, Asian and South American theologians. I still remember how dismissive many of my colleagues were of liberation theology which grew out a culture of oppression, of Indian theologies that grew out of cultures of poverty and of South African Black theology which grew out of a culture of apartheid. Reading authors like Gustavo Gutiérrez and Cornel West has forced me to ask uncomfortable questions that have begun to liberate me from my culture bound vision of Jesus. Listening to my friends at NAIITS and indigenous peoples in Australia and North America has even more deeply impacted me and I know I still have much to learn.
Each time I work cross culturally I try to listen for new perspectives. Often I find myself back at the drawing board wondering how I need to reshape my faith so that I am not excluding those whom God embraces. Jesus’ parables often focus on God’s inclusion of those whom the Jewish culture excluded – Samaritans, women, lepers, sinners, were all included in his embrace. I am sure that as he told these stories the worldview and the culture of the people who embraced his message was slowly changed too.
God’s family is drawn from every culture and tribe and nation. We are on a journey together learning to understand and walk together in partnership with our sisters and brothers from around the world. When we know we are all part of God’s family, we will willingly seek for understanding, reconciliation and new ways of sharing life so that we all become one community as God intended us to be.
What is your response?
We live in such a divided world. What do you think it will take for us to sit down with people of all races and cultures and create a new theological table together? Sit quietly in the presence of God and allow the Spirit to guide you. Watch the video below with images and music from different cultures. What are one or two action steps you could take to broaden your understanding of other cultural perspectives?
~This post is old. Please check out our lastest for Creative Lent Ideas here~
Lent is only a few weeks away and many of us are already thinking about what we will give up for the season. Once only practiced by catholic and liturgical churches, Lent is now popular amongst churches of all traditions. To be honest however, I get sick and tired of people telling me they are going to give up chocolate or T.V. for Lent, not because I don’t think this type of self sacrifice is important but because I feel it trivializes Lent.
There are two types of spiritual practices we need in our lives – those that restore and those that transform. Lent was meant to be a season of transformation, but we have made it more into one of restoration.
Restorative practices, are the daily, weekly and yearly habits that anchor our faith and reassure us of the importance of what we believe. Practices like daily prayer, Sunday church, Easter and Christmas, reaffirm our sense of order and meaning in the universe, our community and our own lives. Most importantly, they intentionally connect our daily activities to the life, death and resurrection of Christ.
Transformative practices are characterized by a high degree of creativity and have little repetitive structure. They cut through the established way of doing things and restore a measure of flexibility and personal intimacy. They stop our restorative practices from becoming boring and stagnant and enable our faith to grow, adapt and change.
Lent was specifically designed for transformation. It was once about preparation for baptism and our entry into resurrection life, but for most, it now focuses more on sacrifice and death, often with little expectation of ongoing change in our lives. The focus has moved from Easter Sunday to Good Friday and our entering into Christ’s crucifixion and death.
So how do we invite the spirit of God into that creative process? We need to bring about transformation so that we can enter the resurrected life of Easter?
Take an Artist Date.
In Restoring the Wellsprings: A Lenten Retreat into Creative Practice, the authors suggest taking an “artist date” each week in Lent.
Once a week, it’s your job to take yourself out to have fun for an hour or two. Do it alone, and choose something that you might not normally allow yourself: an excursion to a gallery to look at art; a trip to a fabric store; a walk in a public garden you love, or have always wanted to visit; a ferry ride to explore the Island. This should be gratuitous and self-indulgent. In short, you are to give up self-denial for Lent.”
The place we need to start is with more fun and creativity. Experiences like this free our minds to think outside the box and restore that flexibility we so desperately need to reshape our spiritual lives and draw closer to God.
Get Out and Take Notice.
Over the last few years, I have been encouraged by fellow journeyers to get out and take notice of my neighbourhood, God’s creation and the people who populate it. I have learned to take the practices of Lectio divina and Visio divina, out into the world around me. I love exploring the neighbourhood graffiti, murals and garden art. I love observing the people Tom and I pass as we walk and taking notice of the new plants emerging and the migratory birds on the lake. This has freed my spirit to listen deeply and observe all that happens around me, inspiring me to incorporate new practices into my spiritual life in ways I could never have imagined even five years ago.
Give Free Reign to Creativity.
I think that by now, most of you realize that I am a strong advocate for free form creative practices like doodling, walking a finger labyrinth, and painting on rocks. Even crafts like knitting and woodworking can spur creativity and improve our problem solving ability. Consider setting aside time for one of these practices each week during Lent. Perhaps you would like to knit a prayer shawl or craft a toy for a disabled kid you know. Such practices are guaranteed to inspire new creative spiritual practices too.
Get Out and Have Some Fun
We all need to play. Making a mess, getting dirty, colouring, playing sports, are all rejuvenating practices that free us from inflexible thought patterns and routines. In our hectic, modern lives, many of us focus so heavily on work and family commitments that we never have time for pure fun. Just because we’re adults, doesn’t mean we have to take ourselves so seriously and make life all about work.
Perhaps Lent is a time to let go of control over what we do and hand the plan of celebrations over to our kids. I mentioned in my last year’s post Five Ways to Foster Creativity In Kids During Lent, how meaningful it was to give five-year-old Catie control of creativity for Easter. We underestimate the creativity of kids and their ability to shape their practices as well as our own.
Focus on Life Not Death.
As you walk through Lent, are you hungering for life or death? Are your practices focused on the cross or the kingdom? How would it change our Lenten practices if our goal was resurrection living rather then Cross walking? Lent is a time to daydream, to imagine new possibilities for the in-breaking of God’s new world.
What are the aspects of God’s longed-for new world that gnaws at your heart, making you want to respond? A few years ago, I did a series of posts on What Does the Kingdom of God Look Like? that you might like to read through as you contemplate this question.
Or read through these inspiring words from Isaiah 65:17-25. This is one of my favourite passages of inspiration and hope about the kingdom of God. I read it frequently as a way to keep myself focused on God’s purposes not just for me but for the entire creation.
Lent has become a popular practice for people of all Christian traditions in the last few years. I hope that you will consider observing it this year and walk with us into God’s kingdom ways.
You might also like to check out some of my Lenten resource lists – I am in the process of updating these so if you know of “must add” resources, please let me know.
Apps and More for your Lenten Journey
Ash Wednesday Prayers – with links to those from previous years.
I have also added several posts this year on creativity and Lent:
5 Ways to Foster Creativity in Children for Lent
Get Creative and Play Games in Lent
Seven Tips for Creating Sacred Space in Lent
Please check out our complete list of Godspace resources for Lent through Holy Week
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