sacrificing joy
lection reflection for 4 Dec 2019 / reading the bible daily with the church
I didn't write on yesterday's readings because I have been fighting a raging sinus infection which put writing about as far away from my mind as is possible. This, really, pales in comparison to the struggles of several people close to us. Within 24 hours of Monday's post on deliverance and rest, a friend going through a . . .
Posted in: adventreflections
advent: learning to wait in an impatient culture
why we desperately need the training ground of advent
(this is an updated version of a post I originally wrote in 2017)
In a letter to his fiancee Maria von Wedmeyer from prison in December 1943, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote:
Celebrating Advent means being able to wait. Waiting is an art that our impatient age has forgotten...Whoever does not know the austere blessedness . . .
deliverance and rest
lection reflection for 2 Dec 2019 / reading the bible daily with the church
Today's readings (Gen 3.1-24 and Mt 11.25-30) expand on the petitions of this week's collect, in which we pray rescue from our sins and God's mighty deliverance. They flesh out these requests by teaching us and reminding us of our need for redemption (from Genesis) and the benefits of God's salvation in Christ (from . . .
Posted in: adventreflections
the first Sunday in Advent
contemplating collects
Stir up, we beseech Thee, Thy power, O Lord, and come; that by Thy protection we may be rescued from the threatening perils of our sins, and saved by Thy mighty deliverance; Who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
-- Common Service Book of the Lutheran . . .
contemplating collects
musings on our inherited weekly prayers
For some time now, the blog Anglican Pastor has featured an on-going series titled, "Collect Reflections" in which the weekly collects from the Book of Common Prayer are posted, explained, and thoughtfully considered.
Those unfamiliar with the term 'collect' might ask, "What exactly is a collect?" . . .
after two months of silence
returning to writing at the beginning of the church year
It's been two months since I've posted any original reflections or writings. Two months! Where on earth have I been, and what have I been doing? Great questions.
Though much of October, while still reading the daily lectionary readings as part of morning prayer, I was compiling and editing a new daily prayer book that . . .
Posted in: writing
Luther on casting burdens upon the Lord
"Cast your burden on the Lord, and He shall sustain you..." Ps 55.22
Whoever desires to be a Christian must learn to believe this, and to exercise this faith in all his affairs, in physical and in spiritual things, in doing and in suffering, in living and dying, and to cast aside all anxious thoughts and care and throw them cheerfully off. Yet he must not throw them into a corner, as some have . . .
