Prayer for the World January 10, 2024

Through the Doorway

Invitation to Prayer

Nawang Khechog - Quiet Mind

Gathering Spoken Word Prayer

“Listen” Stu Garrard and Becky Harding

Scripture

 ” ..they departed for their country by another way” (MT 2:12)

Let us keep our eyes alert for the new way…

We look with uncertainty

– Anne Hillman

We look with uncertainty

beyond the old choices for

clear-cut answers

to a softer, more permeable aliveness

which is at every moment

at the brink of death;

for something new is being born in us

if we but let it.

We stand at a new doorway,

awaiting that which comes…

daring to be human creatures,

vulnerable to the beauty of existence.

Learning to love.

Questions for Reflection

– from a post by Parker Palmer, December 31, 2017

“Once again, I’ll take a pass on making New Year’s resolutions. Instead, I’ll take Rilke’s famous advice about ‘living the questions,’ and carry into the New Year a few of the wonderings that Anne Hillman’s poem evokes in me.

Call it ‘Five Questions for Crossing the Threshold’

• How can I let go of my need for fixed answers in favor of aliveness?

• What is my next challenge in daring to be human—in personal, relational, and political terms?

• How can I open myself to the beauty of nature and human nature?

• Who or what do I need to learn to love next? And next? And next?

• What is the new creation that wants to be born in and through me?

We look with uncertainty to the year ahead. But if we wrap our lives around life-giving questions—and live our way into their answers a bit more every day—the better world we want and need is more likely to come into being.”

Weekly Practice

Why fake peace is worse than healthy conflict, Priya Parker

Notice where you experience “heat pockets” this week.

Describe your relationship to conflict.

Closing Prayer

Give us the grace to walk through the doorway of this new year. May we be willing to be present in discomfort, courageous in moments of conflict, and ready to be people of communion on the journey.

Closing Song: As One, Denean