Category: Liturgy

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Affirmation of Faith Liturgy

Affirmation of faith: Creator God who pulls open every shut door

As one, let us affirm our faith.

We believe in one Triune God, Creator of all things.
In that Beginning shared in Genesis,
She brooded over watery darkness, as in the womb,
and gave birth to Creation in all its remarkable diversity — 

including the day and night, and the various shades of dawn and dusk between;
including the sea and land, and the shores at which they meet;
including the plants and all kinds of animals, and beyond them
— the mollusks and fungi, and unicellular life…

and, finally, including human beings
with our vast diversity of mind and body
all crafted in the divine image.

We believe in one Triune God, Redeemer of humanity,
who came to Abraham and Sarah, Hagar and Ishmael,
Jacob and Rachel and Joseph;
who came to Moses — a stranger in a strange land, unsure of where he belonged — and liberated the Hebrew people from their bondage;

and who, in the Person of Jesus Christ,
entered Creation to liberate all peoples from all forms of bondage,
to redeem us even from sin, even from death itself. 

We believe in one Triune God, Sustainer of all things,
in whom we live, and move, and have our being

whose Spirit breathes life back into parched lands and withered hearts,
and pulls open every door we would keep shut,
sweeps away every line we draw in the sand.

I wrote this for a virtual service on August 16, 2020 (15A Proper), a service that centered around themes of reconciliation and interdependence. I preached on Genesis 45:1-15, exploring Joseph’s gender nonconformity as a source for the brothers’ violence against Joseph; how Joseph was brought from suffering into thriving and was celebrated for the very gifts that the brothers had hated; and how Joseph as the wronged party got to choose how and when reconciliation would take place.

Meanwhile, I wove that theme of reconciliation into my liturgy alongside our need for community and to draw the circles of our community ever wider, drawing from the alternative reading Isaiah 56:1-8.

To read or watch my sermon, visit here.

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Call to worship Liturgy

Call to worship and opening prayer: draw the circle wide; God gathers us in our diversity

Beloved community, let us draw the circle wide!
And draw it wider still.

We come — laden with doubts, fears, resentments —
to worship the God who gives us faith, courage, renewal. 

We come — overwhelmed with remorse,
or struggling with what it means to forgive — 
to worship the God who teaches us true restoration. 

We come — with identities varied as the colors of the rainbow —
to worship the God who weaves our many threads into one tapestry.

We come, and the circle is drawn wide — and wider — and wider still!
Not by our strength, not by our merit, but through God’s grace.

OPENING PRAYER

God the Gatherer,
God the Grafter,
God the Weaver of our many threads into a colorful whole —
In which no color drowns out any other, and all have their role in the tapestry — 

Open us to your presence today, now!
Pour like rain into the cracked soil of our parched spirits; 
Seep into our dreams and set us alight with grand new visions of You.

Nourishing rain in desert places,
Night’s relief among sun-burned sands,
Revitalize us so we can worship you 
With the joy and wholeheartedness you deserve.

Amen.

I wrote this for a virtual service on August 16, 2020 (15A Proper), a service that centered around themes of reconciliation and interdependence. I preached on Genesis 45:1-15, exploring Joseph’s gender nonconformity as a source for the brothers’ violence against Joseph; how Joseph was brought from suffering into thriving and was celebrated for the very gifts that the brothers had hated; and how Joseph as the wronged party got to choose how and when reconciliation would take place.

Meanwhile, I wove that theme of reconciliation into my liturgy alongside our need for community and to draw the circles of our community ever wider, drawing from the alternative reading Isaiah 56:1-8. This is why the above liturgy is all about expanding our community and God’s gathering of all persons.

To read or watch my sermon, visit here.

Categories
Affirmation of Faith Liturgy

Affirmation of Faith: Creator God-with-us, whose existence is relationship

We believe in the Triune God whose very existence is relationship,
a dance of mutual love that overflows into Their creation.

As beings made in the image of this relational God, 
we are most human when we live outside of hierarchy and individualism
and live into community with God, with each other, and with all creation.

We believe in Jesus Christ, the surest example of God-with-us,
of God-for-us, of a God whose power is not dominance and control
but rather a love that empowers, liberates, and invites us into partnership. 

We believe in the Holy Spirit
who brooded over the deep until She birthed the universe,

who is the breath that animates us,
the air that whispers to seeds till they sprout and bloom,

the wind that stirs up stagnance,
the flame that burns up deadness to make a way for new life.

We believe that this Triune God invites us to join Them 
in sowing a Kin(g)dom of equity and justice here on earth

where God’s blessings are shared fairly and there is plenty for all.

I wrote this for a service with a central theme of imagination, and how God’s gift of imagination can help us envision and enact a better world, a world liberated from oppressive binary and hierarchical structures like cishetero-patriarchy and white supremacy. My sermon’s text was Genesis 25:19-34 and explored the relationship between Jacob – with his marginalizing identities who assimilates into patriarchy – and Esau with his privilege who eventually seeks out reconciliation with his brother. You can read or watch the sermon here.

While the Genesis text was my sermon focus, I wanted to fit the lectionary’s Gospel reading into my liturgy. That reading was Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23, the Parable of the Sower.

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Confession and Pardon Liturgy

Confession and Pardon: harming Creation, exploiting our siblings

God of justice, God of mercy, as one we confess our failings:

Though you conceived all the cosmos and called it Good,
We disregard the holiness of Creation, exploiting it for our own gain.

Though you gave birth to one human race
bestowing your image and your blessing on every human being,
We deny that image in those we mark as Other,
as if there were only enough blessing for some of us.

We rob our siblings of their autonomy and dignity;
we force them to live in fear and poverty,
and use their very bodies to fuel our own prosperity. 

And when we are the ones oppressed, our exhaustion and fear poison us,
warping our ability to trust, causing us to lash out at those we love.

In this dog-eat-dog world, this zero-sum game of divide-and-conquer, 
We become too wrapped up in our own survival
to lift up our siblings drowning alongside us.

ASSURANCE OF PARDON

Friends, our remorse is a sign of God’s grace already at work within us. Assured of God’s mercy, we are free to seek new ways of being together. 

God’s Word forgives and redeems us. God’s Breath revitalizes us for the journey. Emboldened by this good news, let us share God’s love with one another. 

I wrote this for a service with a central theme of imagination, and how God’s gift of imagination can help us envision and enact a better world, a world liberated from oppressive binary and hierarchical structures like cishetero-patriarchy and white supremacy. My sermon’s text was Genesis 25:19-34 and explored the relationship between Jacob – with his marginalizing identities who assimilates into patriarchy – and Esau with his privilege who eventually seeks out reconciliation with his brother. You can read or watch the sermon here.

While the Genesis text was my sermon focus, I wanted to fit the lectionary’s Gospel reading into my liturgy. That reading was Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23, the Parable of the Sower.

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Call to worship Liturgy

Call to worship and opening prayer: God the sower who invites our partnership

Beloved community, we gather to worship the God who invites us to join Them in creating a new world.

When our souls are trampled on, made too hard to bear fruit,
Let us gather.

When our hearts exclaim over God’s word for a moment,
but never break open to let it sink in,
Let us gather.

When the cares of the world prick at and stifle our spirits like thorns,
leaving no room for joy or hope, no time for kindness or compassion,
Let us gather. 

And when God comes, heals, cultivates in us hearts soft enough to receive, to nurture, to blossom,
Let us gather to worship our Creator, our Redeemer, the Breath within our lungs.

OPENING PRAYER

God of Life in all its seasons,
you are the Sower who softens us like soil,
slowly but surely, so that your Word may sprout in us. 

You are the source of the water, the sun, the air 
that sustain our being and unite us with all living things. 

You are the Wind that stirs our stagnation,
who takes us by the hands and pulls us into action,
inviting us to be co-laborers in the hard harvest work
as your Kin(g)dom takes root, grows, and blossoms across the world.

We come to worship
you who guide all Creation into flourishing.

I wrote this for a service with a central theme of imagination, and how God’s gift of imagination can help us envision and enact a better world, a world liberated from oppressive binary and hierarchical structures like cishetero-patriarchy and white supremacy. My sermon’s text was Genesis 25:19-34 and explored the relationship between Jacob – with his marginalizing identities who assimilates into patriarchy – and Esau with his privilege who eventually seeks out reconciliation with his brother. You can read or watch the sermon here.

While the Genesis text was my sermon focus, I wanted to fit the lectionary’s Gospel reading into my liturgy. That reading was Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23, the Parable of the Sower – hence references to God as sower in the liturgy above.

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Affirmation of Faith Liturgy

Affirmation of Faith: God of Hagar, Ishmael, Sarah, Abraham; God of oppressor and oppressed

We believe in the God of Sarah and Abraham
who does not let injustice go unchecked,
but who also does not abandon us in our sin.

We believe in the God of Hagar and Ishmael
who sees the outcast, who hears the cry of the oppressed,
and responds with compassion and blessing.

We believe that God is God for oppressor and oppressed alike,
that Her justice rolls down like mighty waters, 
even while her mercies are renewed every morning.

We believe God holds us accountable for our sins, individual and communal,
and shows us a way out of the prisons we build around ourselves and others.

God of Hagar, God of Sarah,
See us. Hear us. Liberate us from our own sin, 
and from the harm others inflict on us.

Amen.

I wrote this for a virtual service on June 21, 2020 (7A Proper) centered around themes of oppression, patriarchy, and white supremacy; it explored how our world shapes each of us based on our various identities and what kind of reconciliation is possible between oppressors and the ones who oppress. My sermon text was Genesis 21:8-21. My sermon, “No Good Patriarchs – Solidarity with Hagar” can be read or watched here.

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Invitation to the table Liturgy

Invitation to the table: outcasts welcome, bring your struggles and guilt

Sisters, brothers, and siblings in Christ,

When we are shunned, shamed, called unloveable,
Jesus sets a place for us.

When we are the ones doing the shunning and shaming,
Jesus sets a place for us, too, inviting us into a better way. 

Whoever you are, whatever struggles you face,
whatever guilt weighs you down,
come. Join us. This is God’s table, and Her feast is for all.

I wrote this for a virtual service on June 21, 2020 centered around themes of oppression, patriarchy, and white supremacy; it explored how our world shapes each of us based on our various identities and what kind of reconciliation is possible between oppressors and the ones who oppress. My sermon text was Genesis 21:8-21. My sermon, “No Good Patriarchs – Solidarity with Hagar” can be read or watched here.

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Call to worship Liturgy Opening prayer

Call to worship and opening prayer: God gathers the oppressed, and the oppressors

Beloved community,
We come together as one
while under different roofs.

We come together as one
while holding different ideas, dreams, struggles, fears.

We come together as one
as outcasts, and as those who cast out others.

We come together as one
gathered by the One
who befriended the oppressed
and the oppressor.

Let us worship God.

OPENING PRAYER

Strange God, untameable God,
You will not let us confine you or your children to a box!

You lavish love upon those we call unloveable;
You embrace those we shut out and call stranger;
and you delight in choosing people who shock us
to bring your blessing into the world. 

God who died and rose again,
You look upon barrenness and unkindness and hopelessness 
and say, “I can work with this.” 

When you touch death, it blossoms into life.
You make a way out of no way. 

Fearsome God, gentle God,
When we are merciless
you come in mercy.

When we deny justice
you come with justice.

We come with praise. We come with prayer.
We come with gratitude to you
Our creator, our redeemer, the breath within our lungs. 

I wrote this for a virtual service on June 21, 2020 centered around themes of oppression, patriarchy, and white supremacy; it explored how our world shapes each of us based on our various identities and what kind of reconciliation is possible between oppressors and the ones who oppress. My sermon text was Genesis 21:8-21. My sermon, “No Good Patriarchs – Solidarity with Hagar” can be read or watched here.

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Call to worship LGBT/queer Liturgy Multifaith Weddings

A call to worship that welcomes non-Christian participants

The Being worshipped in this space
is vaster than walls can contain or religions can claim.

All true loves have this Being as their source,
and so the love we celebrate today
transcends gender and bloodlines and state borders.

Here we are united
in all our diversity:

welcome, you with faith and you with doubts,
you from the North and you from the South,
welcome with all your joys and pains, fears and hopes.

We invite you to join us in praising the One
who fashioned human beings to experience all sorts of love.

Here in this space,
Love grafts us together.

This is the call to worship that I wrote for my wedding back in May 2019. Because many of the attendees were not Christian, I wanted to explicitly welcome them into worship too.

The language of this call to worship is rather specific to the context (for instance, the reference to North and South is because most of my relatives hail from the Northern portion of the United States, while most of my wife’s hail from the South; plus all the “love” stuff is clearly because it was for a queer wedding), so feel free to edit this piece to suit your own context.