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Charge and Benediction Liturgy

General benedictions – thanksgiving, joy, solidarity, lament

Below are several charges + benedictions that may be fitting for various worship services – some for general or joyful services, and others for services that focus on lament or solidarity with the oppressed.

Friends,
The Triune God whose self-sustaining love overflows into all Creation,
who whirls into our lives and sweeps us up in Their lively dance,

now sends us dancing out into Their world
to fill its empty aching with God’s love,
to subdue its pain with Their peace,
to make Their good news known far and wide
in what we say and what we do.

So let us go, glorifying the Source of life in all we do
and growing in Their love.

Let us go, following after the Redeemer of life
and striving to follow the example He set through His ministry.

Let us go, hand in hand with the Sustainer of life
allowing Her to use our hands to transform death
into new, radiant, abundant life for all creation.
Amen.

[referencing protests and activism]

Siblings in Christ,

Nourished by song and by scripture, by God’s Word proclaimed and Christ’s Body shared, it is time for us to go and be a nourishment to others. Whether at home or at work, at the park or at a protest, let us live out God’s good news of liberation and community for the world. 

Go in peace, go with courage, in the name of the One who creates, sustains, and redeems you.

[drawing loosely from Exodus 17:1-7]

Beloved community,

How can we thank God for the abundance that Xe has lavished upon us here? Only by responding in kind, by feeding one another as God has fed us. 

So let us go now, encouraged by the knowledge that we do not go alone:
we have each other;
and the one who Creates, Sustains, and Redeems us is in our midst,
blessing and empowering us for the work ahead.

[drawing from Psalm 23]

Shepherd God,

We have worshiped you and praised you for gathering us,
diverse as we are, into one flock.
Now, it is time for us to enter back into the world.

Lead us forth, guiding us through valleys and shadows,
protecting us as we dine not only with friends
but also with foes,
in the hopes of becoming one with them too.

Help us to be shepherds as well as your sheep,
guiding one another through valleys of shadow
to food, to water, to rest.

The way is not easy, but we rejoice,
because you guide us always
and because you give us to one another
to serve you and to be your church together.

Amen.

[suitable for services of lament / that address suffering, anger, etc.]

Comrades in Christ,
Here we have received good reason to believe
that the God of the Oppressed is with us in solidarity

– not only when we are content or joyful
but also when we are grieving,
when we are enraged,
when we feel disappointed in God,
when we cannot feel God.

Assured of God’s steadfast presence, let us go out
into a world full of grief and disappointment,
full of downtrodden spirits and tortured bodies,
and join God in Their solidarity with all who cry out for justice.

Amen.

Categories
Invitation to the table Liturgy Prayer after Communion

Invitation to the table and prayer after communion: come with your doubts

Sisters, brothers, and siblings in Christ,
as we gather around different tables to partake in the same feast,
let no one be afraid to wonder, “Is God really in our midst?”

Let no one be ashamed to admit they do not fully believe or understand —
for who among us does? 

Jesus truly does welcome us — welcomes you! — to his table just as you are, with your doubts and your dread, your trauma and your pain.
So come, sit with us, and be fed by the One who loves you dearly.

PRAYER AFTER COMMUNION

Jesus our Lord and our sibling, 
At this table you have proclaimed your resounding “Yes!” to our question, “Is God really here with us?”

Through the sharing of your life, your love, your Spirit, you take up our causes as if they were your own. All we can say is thank you. Thank you. Amen.

I wrote this for a virtual service centered around trauma and community’s role in the journey to recovery; an affirmation of protest is also woven throughout the liturgy. My sermon was based around Exodus 17:1-7, looking at the wilderness wandering through a lens of generational trauma and applying it to the collective and individual traumas we are facing today, from those caused by pandemic and police violence to personal struggles.

For this invitation, I draw from the Exodus reading.

Watch or read my sermon here.

Categories
Affirmation of Faith Liturgy

Affirmation of faith: self-emptying God who knows our trauma

Alone, we have doubts, and struggle to believe,
but in community we have all the faith that God requires of us,
even if only the tiniest mustard seed. 
So as one, let us affirm our faith:

We believe in the God of Moses, God the Liberator,
Who revealed Their name from a burning bush,
Who chooses self-restraint in order to leave room for our free will.

We believe in Jesus Christ, who opens his arms to our unbelief
for he knew what it was to be human,
to experience fear, grief, and pain —
even the trauma of the cross.

Though God, he had no interest in exaltation, but chose self-emptying: 

In Jesus, Divinity stripped off omnipotence 
becoming utterly dependent on a human womb; he grew, learned,
and leaned into interdependence within a human community.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus sent to us
after his rising to be God in our midst:
Disrupter of authority, Upturner of the status quo,
Kindler of curiosity and Breath of rebirth in times of upheaval. 

We believe that this Triune God, whose name evokes Steadfastness,
dwells in our midst yesterday, today, and for all time,
empowering our partnership and renewing all of Creation.

Amen.

I wrote this for a virtual service centered around trauma and community’s role in the journey to recovery; an affirmation of protest is also woven throughout the liturgy. My sermon was based around Exodus 17:1-7, looking at the wilderness wandering through a lens of generational trauma and applying it to the collective and individual traumas we are facing today, from those caused by pandemic and police violence to personal struggles.

For this affirmation, I also incorporated the NT reading Philippians 2:1-13, which talks about Christ’s self-emptying.

Watch or read my sermon here.

Categories
Confession and Pardon Liturgy

Confession and pardon: trauma, isolation, scarcity and individualism

God With Us, as one we confess our failings:

In times of trauma and hardship,
you call us to lean on one another and on you.
But we retreat into ourselves instead,
to wallow in our own troubles alone.  
We imagine ourselves to be burdens,
or accuse others of being dead weight. 

In a world whose resources we have poisoned,
a society divided into the haves and the have-nots,
your promise of abundance is just about impossible to believe.

And so we fall prey to myths of scarcity and individualism
that transform friends into enemies,
comrades into competitors.

When we deny our place in the network of your Creation,
when we reject the protests of those who thirst for justice,
when we fail to question authority,

Challenge us. Teach us. Restore us to your Way. 

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 liberated to seek new ways of being together. 

I wrote this for a virtual service centered around trauma and community’s role in the journey to recovery; an affirmation of protest is also woven throughout the liturgy. My sermon was based around Exodus 17:1-7, looking at the wilderness wandering through a lens of generational trauma and applying it to the collective and individual traumas we are facing today, from those caused by pandemic and police violence to personal struggles.

Watch or read my sermon here.

Categories
Call to worship Liturgy

Call to worship and opening prayer

Beloved community,

Though we remain separated by physical space,
the Spirit who transcends walls and borders gathers us together. 

We come as a community on a journey
Still learning how to show up for each other
And how to live into God’s Kin(g)dom.

We come with minds buzzing with questions,
or burdened by mental illness;
We come with spirits heavy with loneliness, grief, or dread;
We come with bodies weary with pain, sickness, or fatigue
To worship a God who hears, feels, and responds.

OPENING PRAYER

Oh you who are Holy Other and God With Us,

You choose to enter our daily lives,
to share our burdens with us.

You pervade space, time, and all the divisions we devise:
You who came to Moses and liberated an enslaved people,
You who came to them in fire and in darkness
to carry them through the wilderness
truly are the same God here in our midst today. 

We have come to worship you, strange and steadfast God
Who makes a way out of no way.

I wrote this for a virtual service on September 27, 2020 (21A Proper) centered around trauma and community’s role in the journey to recovery; an affirmation of protest is also woven throughout the liturgy. My sermon was based around Exodus 17:1-7, looking at the wilderness wandering through a lens of generational trauma and applying it to the collective and individual traumas we are facing today, from those caused by pandemic and police violence to personal struggles.

Watch or read my sermon here.

Categories
Invitation to the table Liturgy

Invitation to the table: Let no one be led to believe, “I have no place here.”

Sisters, brothers, and siblings in the Living God,
in a world of fear and famine,
you will find no walls erected around Christ’s table;
nor will its bounty ever run dry. 

You need not have a perfect faith,
or look or act a certain way,
to partake.

Let no one say, “God has cut me off from the Body.”
Let no one be led to believe, “I have no place here.”
For Jesus stands, and beckons, and says,
“Come! Yes, you! Come, and be fed.”

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. The above liturgy quotes directly from the Isaiah text.

To read or watch my sermon, visit here.

Categories
Liturgy Prayer of Dedication

Prayer of dedication: God gathers across diverse communities

O God who gathers more, and still more, people to your table — 
a table that is not contained by our one church, but extends 
across varied worship spaces,
across diverse cultures and communities —

bless the gifts that each of us brings today.
May they strengthen bodies and nourish spirits,
and be used for your glory.

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 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 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.

Categories
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.