Opening Song: Morning Prayer, I Will Surrender by Karen Drucker https://youtu.be/Zjamx4MtAYw
Opening Prayer: Holy One, we gather on this day in this beautiful place as spring is just beginning its awakening. As we listen to your voice in the singing of birds, the flowing of freshly-thawed streams and the blowing of fresh wind we know that our fellow creatures listen as well. They hear your voice in the stronger sun, longer daylight hours, warming soil, and they respond with growth, flowing sap, and the movement of migration. Let us join with them in a deep faith that what has died will live again, what has been buried will rise again, and what has been shut up in darkness will spring open into new light and burst into a chorus of praise. Amen.
Watered Gardens, by Joyce Rupp
God of little buds just now wearing green sleeves,
God of lilac limbs all full with signs of flowering,
God of fields plowed and black with turned-over earth,
God of screeching baby bird mouths widely awaiting food,
God of openness, of life and of resurrection,
Come into this season and bless me.
Look around the tight, dead spaces of my heart
That still refuse to give you entrance.
Bring your gentle but firm love.
Begin to lift the layers of resistance
That hang on tightly deep inside of me.
Open, one by one, those places in my life
Where I refuse to be overcome by surprise.
Open, one by one, those parts of my heart
Where I fight the entrance of real growth.
Open, one by one, those aspects of my spirit
Where my security struggles with the truth.
Keep me open to the different and the strange;
Help me accept the unusual and also the ordinary;
Never allow me to tread on others dreams
By shutting them out, closing them up,
By turning them off or pushing them away.
God of the Resurrection, God of the Living,
Untomb and uncover all that needs to live in me.
Take me to people, events and situations
And stretch me into much greater openness.
Open me. Open me. Open me.
For it is only then that I will grow and change.
For it is only then that I will be transformed.
It is only then that I will know how it is
To be in the moment of rising from the dead.
Reading: Psalm 34, “Psalms for Praying,” Nan Merrill
Everyone separated from Love is empty
and hungry within;
But those who open their hearts to
the Beloved,
are filled to over flowing.
O come and see, come and hear,
how we honor the Beloved.
Many there are who desire Life,
who yearn for fulfillment,
who covet the wisdom of Truth.
Keep your heart open and free,
make time to dwell in Silence,
Become a peaceful presence in the world.
Closing Song: One Voice, Shaina Noll
Spring Retreat Closing Prayer Draft (Denise)
Opening prayer: Let us breathe in this day.....(breathe in) And let us breathe out blessing and Thanksgiving for it....(breathe out). For the community we have built together, for this beautiful space, for the wisdom so generously shared today, we give thanks. We enter Holy Week with all of that as vehicle and nourishment. We come as we are each with our own burden, each with our own doubt. Each with our own hope. We come ready and open, seeing and hearing, to walk with our Brother Jesus. Amen
Opening Song: Come as You Are, The Many
Reading: From Brian McLaren, We Make the Road by Walking
We were afraid that first Sunday night, just three days after Jesus died. Really afraid. We were afraid to go outside in case someone might recognize us as Jesus’ friends and notify the authorities. . . .
So there we remained, tense, jumpy, simmering with anxiety. What happened Friday had been ugly, and we didn’t want it to happen to the rest of us. Every sound startled us. Suddenly, we all felt something, a presence, familiar yet . . . impossible. How could Jesus be among us? . . .
And from that night, we learned something essential about what this uprising is going to be about.
[This uprising of the gospel] isn’t just for brave people, but for scared folks like us who are willing to become brave. It isn’t just for believers, but for doubting folks like Thomas who want to believe in spite of their skepticism. It isn’t just for good people, but for normal, flawed people like you and me and Thomas and Peter.
And I should add that it isn’t just for men, either. It’s no secret that men in our culture often treat women as inferior. Even on resurrection morning, when Mary Magdalene breathlessly claimed that the Lord was risen, the men among us didn’t offer her much in the way of respect. There were all sorts of ignorant comments about “the way women are.” Now we realize the Lord was telling us something by bypassing all of the male disciples and appearing first to a woman. As we look back, we realize he’s been treating women with more respect than the rest of us have right from the start.
We have a term for what we began to experience that night: fellowship. Fellowship is a kind of belonging that isn’t based on status, achievement, or gender, but instead is based on a deep belief that everyone matters, everyone is welcome, and everyone is loved, no conditions, no exceptions. It’s not the kind of belonging you find at the top of the ladder among those who think they are the best, but at the bottom among all the rest, with all the other failures and losers who have either climbed the ladder and fallen, or never gotten up enough gumption to climb in the first place.
Whatever else this uprising will become, from that night we’ve known it is an uprising of fellowship, a community where anyone who wants to be part of us will be welcome. Jesus showed us his scars, and we’re starting to realize we don’t have to hide ours.
So fellowship is for scarred people, and for scared people, and for people who want to believe but aren’t sure what or how to believe. When we come together just as we are, we begin to rise again, to believe again, to hope again, to live again.
Intentions:
Gathered today as a community we know that the Divine One is among us. With confidence we bring our prayers to this circle of beloved. We invite you to bring your prayers at this time.
General intentions:
For communities everywhere, all over this vast globe. May they thrive in nourishment of body and spirit, may they be refreshed with clean water, grow in love and knowledge, and look upon themselves and their neighbors with kinship.
For the whole of Creation, may it thrive. May we humans learn to protect habitats, curb our use of pesticides and fossil fuels, and become true stewards of the world in which we live.
For these and all of the prayers, concerns and celebrations we hold in our hearts, we pray….. Amen.
Closing Prayer: Holy One we know that we are each a blessed part of your community. We live in hope that each of us, in ways large or small, may bring light and life to this world of ours simply by living our lives in you. As we we go forth from this place we bring with us small seeds. May we plant these seeds in the good earth and as they break and die may they release new life. May they provide sustenance to our fellow creatures, continuing the cycle of life, death and resurrection that we commemorate during this Holy Week. Amen.
Closing song: Song Like a Seed, Sara Thomsen https://youtu.be/5CXoyhfSo4Y
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