Go simply in your spirit – With Joanna and the women who accompanied Jesus

All of us

who provide from our resources

who follow from Galilee

who watch and pray

who see the suffering

who lose lives for Jesus’ sake

who look on from a distance

who stand at the foot of the cross

who prepare spices as symbols of love

who wonder about rolling our stones away

now wait in emptiness …

 

 

Call to Prayer

In the light of the Earth-maker

In the love of the Pain-bearer

In the leading of the Life-Giver

We place ourselves today

 

mosaic-of-woman

 

Silence and stillness

Silent and still, give consent to Love’s presence and action within you.

 

 

Taizé chant:     Stay with me, remain here with me, watch and pray

Click here to listen to the chant

 

 

Psalm 107 (click on the link below to listen to the psalm, or click here to read it)

 

 

For reflection:  (Click on the link below to access each day’s meditation):

Day 1: Joanna, and Mary, and Susanna, and Mary, and Salome, and Mary … and many others

Day 2: Following the Christ

Day 3: Jesus of justice

Day 4: Following the Christ

Day 5: Waiting in the emptiness

 

Advance notice for Thursday this week:

Washday is a new take on Maundy Thursday. Traditionally, church people have washed people’s feet, or more recently offered free shoe-shining on the streets as a way of telling the story of the Last Supper. Washday is all about taking part in practical social action during Lent and Holy Week.

It’s an opportunity to go out and wash anything and everything. It could be cleaning windows for people who would find that difficult, washing a car, washing clothes for homeless people, or washing up mugs in an office.  For more, go to: www.washday.org AND play the video!

 

 

Response

Talk to someone about what today’s reflection might mean.

Using a large bowl filled water, choose a flower to set afloat on the water, as a symbol of surrender – of seeing only the beauty of Jesus, of not noticing the road too hard, but seeing only he who goes before.

 

Taizé chant:     Stay with me, remain here with me, watch and pray

 

 

Closing prayer

May the Spirit

Bless you with discomfort

At easy answers, half-truths and

Superficial relationships so that

You will live deep in your heart.

 

May the Spirit

Bless you with anger

At injustice and oppression

And exploitation of people and the earth

So that you work for

Justice, equity and peace.

 

May the Spirit

Bless you with tears to shed

For those who suffer

So that you will

Reach out your hand

To comfort them.

 

And may the Spirit

Bless you with the foolishness

To think you can make a difference

In the world

So you will do the things

Which others say cannot be done.

 

 

Prayer from the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice,

cited in Called Again by Alan Jamieson (2004)

Philip Garside Publishing NZ, p.141.

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