Liturgy 034: Thine is the Glory

🕊️ A Prayer and a Blessing to (not) Waste Your Life

The way of the Christian is not the way of upward mobility in which our world has invested so much, but the way of downward mobility ending on the cross.
— Henri Nouwen

A person has to get fed up with the ways of the world before he acquires an appetite for the world of grace.
— Eugene Peterson

To pray and actually mean, “Thy Kingdom come,” we must also be able to say “My Kingdoms go.”
— Richard Rohr

For Thine is the Kingdom
and the Power and the Glory forever
— The Lord’s Prayer, United Methodist Hymnal #270

🙏 Prayer

God, I

hear stories,
all stories,
as stories
about
me.

She invites me into her world
vulnerable and open
tears across her cheeks
and there goes my mind
effortlessly telling
stories about
me

I am hero
I am victim
I am martyr

Even as I read the ancient texts
of Abraham and Israel
of Moses and David
of Jesus
of Kingdom Come

my imagination
is as James, John,
and their sweet mother.

Somehow
every sermon
inspires me to think
of school systems
home prices
open doors
and how to have a better marriage in 30 days.

And LORD
you know
my sickened mind
when simplified
is thirst
for control
and power.

They now use the word king
to describe those who were once unseen

How apt now
how rare now
to address you
with this antiquated political office

King?

Subordinate?

Every once in a while
I will feel the smallness
as freedom
the absence of magnificence
as reason
to be in awe.

The joy is
in the unseen part of me…

where a
subversive
quiet
conspiracy
happily sings
this life
is not my own

LORD may the stories I tell
in my unspoken mind
be superimposed
over the words you are writing
in and through
around and apart
from my own.

🕊️ Blessing

May you worship God. May you ponder the mystery of Triune God revealed in the self-emptying love of Jesus, and stand in awe. May you find your proclivities to compensate for weakness as exhausting and unnecessary. May the joy of YHWH flow into your soul, manifesting in a smile as you consider the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory of God.

In the Name of the Almighty One
Amen