Fourth Sunday of Easter – Good Shepherd Sunday – Online Service
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Our Gospel reading today is chock full of images and metaphors. We’ve got a sheepfold and a pasture, a shepherd and sheep, the gatekeeper and the gate, thieves and bandits and strangers. And, apparently Jesus is both the shepherd and the gate. This is a lot to comprehend – especially because pandemic brain is a real thing. Our brains are just not functioning quite the same in the midst of all of this. Yet, there is so much promise in this Gospel reading that we need to hear and remember. So, to help our pandemic brains, this week it seems good to use some alliteration.

Listen for lots of ‘P’ words today as we move through these metaphors.

First, Jesus provides us with passage, a way to move in and out. That language of Jesus as the gate can sound as if there is some fixed point we’re trying to reach. As if we can arrive and enter, then we’ll have it made. We’ll be saved. We’ll be secure. And, if we don’t feel particularly safe and secure, we wonder if we really have arrived. Maybe we don’t have enough faith. Maybe we aren’t really saved? Or, maybe there’s something better out there. Maybe we need to keep searching, keep striving, look elsewhere.

A closer look at the metaphor Jesus uses might be helpful. The point of a gate on a sheepfold is not to arrive at it, go inside it and stay there. If sheep just entered the sheepfold and stayed put, they wouldn’t last long. There isn’t enough grass or water inside. It’s too crowded. Sheep have to go out into the world to find green pastures and still waters. They have to go out in order to run and move and live.

Sheep are saved by passing into and out of the gate. They’re saved from danger each time they enter into the sheepfold at night. They’re saved from starvation each time they go out into pasture in the morning. The gate for the sheepfold provides the passage, the way into rest and the way out into pasture and the wider world. Their lives are saved, day after day, by going out and coming in through that gate.

We are saved, here and now, in the same way. We also need shelter and movement. We need to rest in God and we need to venture out. We need the rhythm of going in and coming out. When Jesus says he is the gate, he isn’t telling us that we have to arrive somewhere and enter and stay there. He is saying in him we are given passage into the way of life that saves us – the way of both resting in the shelter of God and moving out into the world.

Yet sheep don’t always go in and out of the gate on their own. They spook easily. They get stub- born. They get scattered. They need a shepherd who calls them by name and goes ahead of them.

They need a shepherd who leads them out into green pastures and back into rest.

And, that is why it is such good news that Jesus says he is both gate and shepherd. As the gate, he provides the way into rest and the way out into pasture and the wider world. He provides the passage. And, as the shepherd he leads us into what we need when we cannot get there ourselves. He goes ahead of us calling us into life, calling us into rest.

In Jesus the Gate and Shepherd we are given shelter and protection. This doesn’t mean that we will be safe from all harm. It does mean that we are given times of rest and reprieve, peace and well-being as we dwell with God. It does mean that we are sheltered in God and so saved from the power of despair and fear. It does mean that we can venture out into all the pastures of this world in trust and hope knowing our Shepherd goes before us.

Right now, these images are especially poignant when we have to spend so much time sheltered at home. We long to be out and about in the world. We long to gather in this place of rest, of sanctuary where we can see the other sheep in the flock.

As we discern when it is safe and wise to go out into the world, we need to take time to listen to our shepherd’s voice for guidance. And, our shepherd is at work to guide us through the words of scripture – calling us to love our neighbor as ourselves and be mindful of those who are most vulnerable, calling us to be thoughtful and wise and not governed by fear. Our shepherd is also at work through the wisdom of scientists, researchers and public health experts who are working for the protection and wellbeing of our world.

We also need to remember that even as we stay home, our shepherd still leads us into experiences of rest and shelter and experiences of engagement with the world. When we feel stuck at home and stuck mindlessly scrolling through social media, mindlessly staring at a screen …

Still Jesus gives us life-giving rhythms and patterns.
Still he leads us inward into times of worship and prayer.
Still he turns our focus outward into service for the world even when we remain at home.

Jesus is the Gate and the Good Shepherd.
He provides us with passage into protection, passage out into the pasture.
He is the way we experience the abundant life God longs for us all to know.

Third Sunday of Easter – Online Service
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of our risen Savior Jesus.

I love this story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus and their story feels a lot like ours right now.

Granted, there are some details that don’t fit. For one thing, the disciples are outside of their houses, traveling somewhere. Remember what that was like? My car now has amazing gas mileage – it gets 3 months to the gallon.

The disciples are also talking and discussing as they walk along. Which means there are two friends talking in-person – connecting without a phone or a screen! Oh, wouldn’t that be wonderful.

Then a stranger comes up and they just walk and talk with him. Rather than lowering their mask covered faces and passing quickly, they have a conversation as they travel together. And then they share a meal. They sit at a table and break bread with people outside their immediate families.

So, some of the details in this story feel out of reach. Yet so much of it speaks to where we are living right now. The disciples are experiencing terrifying times. They’re trying to make sense of it all. They’ve just seen Jesus crucified. The one they hoped would save their nation is dead and buried. They’re hearing stories from the women that he is alive, but they can’t wrap their heads around that.

As they walk away from Jerusalem, where Jesus was killed, they talk about all these things that have happened in much the same way that we’re talking now about all these things – the out- breaks, the shortages, the press conferences, the orders from governors. They talk and try to understand but nothing makes sense. The path forward feels so uncertain, the road so long.

Then Jesus himself comes and walks alongside them, but they don’t recognize him. In their grief and fear and confusion, they can’t see Jesus for who he is. He asks, “What are you discussing as you walk along?” This stops them in their tracks. How can you not know what’s been going on during these days? They tell this stranger all these things that have happened and then they speak one of the most heartbreaking lines in all of scripture, “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel”. They’d had such bold hopes for themselves, their nation, their world, and it looks now as if those hopes will never be realized.

But we had hoped. This is where the disciples’ story resonates so deeply with our own. We had hoped. We are living these days with so many unfulfilled hopes.

We had hoped to celebrate Easter with family.
We had hoped to go to prom and to graduation parties.
We had hoped to hold the new baby, to go on vacation, to lead a conference.
We had hoped for track season, for soccer season, for more time with the grandchildren, for the sixth grade musical.

This weekend at Good Shepherd we had hoped to remember Ben Blair with a night of music and song and to share in a memorial service for Grace Erickson. We had hoped for a baptism this weekend and for three of our youth to affirm their baptisms on Confirmation Sunday. We had hoped that the youth could lead another fun babysitting night for our young families next weekend and for St. Grubby’s Day next Sunday. We had hoped to celebrate our graduating seniors in worship.

We had hoped.

As we carry these dashed hopes, Jesus walks alongside us as he walked with the disciples. Yet we, like them, don’t always recognize Jesus, especially now. When we can’t gather with the body of Christ, when we can’t share in holy communion, it can be so hard to see that Jesus walks with us. As we live in this time of collective trauma and grief and fear, we struggle to see Jesus. We wonder – where is God in all these things that are happening?

This road to Emmaus story reveals that God is where God always is – in the midst of the suffering walking with us. God enters into our suffering and works new life from within it. This is what God does. This is why it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer. It’s the pattern we see in all the scriptures. God brings life out of chaos in the beginning, God births a new nation formed from a time of slavery in Egypt, God makes a way in the wilderness to bring the people out of exile.

All the scriptures point to God bringing life out of suffering. All the scriptures point to Jesus – a Messiah who suffers to bring new life. It’s hard to wrap our minds around this – a God who suffers.

It’s hard for the disciples on the road to Emmaus to understand this, even as Jesus walks with them, even as he interprets scripture for them.

Yet Jesus stays with the disciples, walking with them, teaching them, opening the scriptures to them. Then, finally they come to a house and sit down together for a meal. Jesus takes some bread and breaks it. “And in the moment of the breaking [the disciples] eyes are opened; and they see Jesus anew. In the moment of the breaking their eyes are opened and they realize it was Jesus who was with them all along.” My friend Bishop Regina Hassanally preached those words on Good Friday and they have stayed with me ever since.

It is in the moment of the breaking that we can see Jesus – for Jesus is present in what is broken and Jesus is close to the brokenhearted. In his earthly ministry, Jesus spent his time with those who suffered deeply because of the brokenness of this world. He said, “Blessed are you who are poor and hungry, weeping and reviled.” He fed those same people by taking a small amount of bread, blessing it and breaking it. Five thousand people were fed with that broken bread.

Before his death, he promised that we too would know him in broken bread. He took bread, broke it and gave it to his disciples saying, “Take and eat, this is my body, broken for you.” In his life and death, Jesus was broken open – his heart, his life, his body broken open in love for this whole hurting world. And by his death and resurrection, Jesus has broken the power of sin, suffering and death. Those things can no longer separate us from God for Jesus has entered into them and broken their hold over us. Jesus is present in every broken moment. Jesus works in broken things to feed and bless and heal and bring new life.

In the breaking, Jesus helps us to see him anew. So, let’s pay attention to what we are seeing now in this moment of global breaking. How is Jesus being made known to us in this broken moment? In the breaking, Jesus opens our eyes to see that he has been with us on our long road all along. So, following where he leads, may our hearts also break open for this world God so loves. For it is from the depths of that breaking, at the very heart of our sorrow and fear, that Jesus comes alongside us. He uses our broken hearts to bless the world with good news – a healing message expressed in word and deed that God works to bring new life from broken hearts and broken dreams. 

Dear People of God,

On this long road with the Coronavirus, when the way ahead looks uncertain, as you try to make sense of all these things that are happening, this world’s Risen Savior is with you. He’s been with you all along.

Amen. 

Second Sunday of Easter – Online Service
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

In these strange times, the good news of Jesus is coming to us through all sorts of different technology. This week it came to me through an email from Good Shepherd’s Visitation Pastor, Pr. Marion Pruitt-Jefferson. She wrote this to me about today’s Gospel reading: “How wonderfully appropriate it is that this week, Jesus just flat out invades the ‘quarantined’ disciples’ home and breathes – not a virus – but God’s peace on them all. No masks – no defenses – just an outpouring of peace that we can breathe right into our bodies. YES!”

Yes, indeed! Thank you Pr. Marion! An outpouring of peace to breathe right into their bodies is just what those first disciples needed. They faced a very real threat from the authorities who had just killed their teacher. They were in a type of quarantine, hiding behind locked doors. When Jesus breathed peace upon them, then they were able to believe and hope and trust. Thomas wasn’t there with them, so of course he struggled to believe – he needed that breath of peace that they had received.

We, too, face a very real threat. We need to be home behind closed doors. And oh, do we need the breath of peace now. So many in our world right now are struggling with shortness of breath and chest pain, so many are trying to breathe through anxiety and fear. There is so much chaos, so much fear.

AND In the midst of all this chaos, God continues to breathe peace and new life for our whole world. This is what God does. This is what God has done from the beginning, what God has done in Christ Jesus, and what God does for you today.

Breathing life is what God has done from the beginning. The two creation stories in the book of Genesis give us wonderful pictures of God breathing.

In Genesis 1 we see God breathing life into chaos. We’re told, in the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, there was a whole lot of chaos. Well, actually it says, “The earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep,” but the Hebrew word for deep can also be translated chaos. So, God is familiar with chaos. And God knows what to do amidst chaos.

We’re told when the earth was a chaotic, formless void, “A wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” The Hebrew word for wind, ruah, also means breath and spirit. So, when there was only chaos, God breathed over the waters. When everything was chaotic, God took a deep breath.

So, in this crazy, chaotic time it is very Godly to pause and take some deep breaths. I’ll invite you to do that with me this morning as we move through this time – inviting you to breathe in, breathe out. If you can’t breathe deeply right now, we’ll do it for you and with you. As we do, we’ll pray silently in solidarity with those who are struggling to breathe for whatever reason. Breathe in, breathe out.

Genesis 1 shows us God breathing life into chaos by the power of the Spirit. It also shows us God speaking life into being through the Word we now call Jesus. God spoke, “Let there be light, and let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and so on.” God breathed and spoke creation in- to being by the power of the Word and the power of the Spirit.

After the first creation story in Genesis 1, we get another one in Genesis 2. That story helps us to know that God doesn’t just breathe out over all the chaos, God also breathes this breath of life into each of us. In Genesis 2, God walks around in the garden and gets down in the dust and we’re told, “form[s] Adam from the dust of the ground and breath[es] into his nostrils the breath of life.” This story shows how very close God is – as close as our breath – forming us, shaping us, breathing life into us.

And, throughout scripture we see that breathing the breath of life isn’t something God has done once. As Psalm 104 says of all living things,³⁰ When you send forth your spirit, (your ruah)^* they are created; and you renew the face of the earth. God continues in every moment to create and breathe out life and peace. Breathe in, breathe out.

God created us to breathe deeply the breath of life. God intends for us to honor and care for all life and breath. And yet, life in this world is marred by sin and sickness, suffering and death. Life in this world is not as God intends it to be.

So many struggle to breathe for all sorts of reasons. So many breathe their last far too soon. We take the gift of breath for granted. We do not care for the life and breath of others. Yet even in this, God is so very close to us. God has entered even into sin, suffering and death with us. God, in Jesus, hung on a cross, cried out with a loud voice and breathed his last. Jesus, the word of God, suffered and died as a result of our own human sin and violence.

All seemed lost, all was chaotic. Jesus’ disciples were huddled behind locked doors in fear. Yet, the Word and Breath of God could not be stopped. The Word and Breath of God overcame all the forces of death to live again and live on. And then Jesus came to the disciples who were locked in fear, panicking, maybe even hyperventilating. He spoke, saying, “Peace be with you,” and then he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Jesus spoke and breathed new life out of the chaos, as it was in the beginning. As it was in the be- ginning is now and ever shall be. Jesus’ word of God comes to us to recreate and renew our life.

Jesus comes to speak peace and breathe out God’s Holy Spirit for all of us and our world.

The breath of the Holy Spirit gives us peace and strength in the midst of our own personal chaos.

It also gives what we need to be part of God’s ongoing, life-giving work of renewal and recreation in our world.

So, we don’t have to panic when we consider the chaos in our own lives, the chaos all around us. We can breathe in God’s Holy Spirit and trust that Jesus is alive and at work in and through us for the sake of the world. We can breathe in God’s Holy Spirit and trust that God is as close to us as our breath.

Let’s take some time to breathe together now.

Easter Sunday – Online Service
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Click here to read scripture passages for the day.

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Where is God amidst this global pandemic?

Where will we find hope, love, life in these times?

Where will we experience Jesus, who is God with us, in the flesh when we can’t gather for worship? Where will we find Jesus?

The women expect to find Jesus at the tomb. They go there to see him, to honor his body. Their world has turned upside down, all their hopes are dashed. They are grief-stricken and afraid. They need to see Jesus. They go where they expect to find him.

Instead, the world continues to shake. An angel appears and says, “Do not be afraid, I know you are looking for Jesus … he is not here. He has been raised … he is going ahead of you … there you will see him.”

We are a lot like the women on that first Easter morning. Our world is shaking, turned upside down. Our hopes and plans have been dashed. We carry such fear and anxiety. In the midst of all of this, we want to see Jesus. We want to honor Jesus’ body by being with his body, the body of Christ; we want to receive his body and blood in Holy Communion. We want to see Jesus.

We want to be here in this place where we know we will encounter Jesus in word and sacrament, music and prayer and the gathered community. This is where we expect to find Jesus.

Yet, beloved of God, he is not here, he has been raised, he is going ahead of you. There you will see him. He is not here. He has been raised. Which is to say, Jesus is not contained in this space, in this place, in all the places where we expect to encounter him.

Jesus has been raised from the dead and is now everywhere present. He is alive and on the loose and out and about in the world. So, Jesus is here, yes, because he’s everywhere; but he is not ONLY here, he is not bound here. Death cannot contain him, buildings cannot contain him, the ways we are accustomed to encountering him cannot contain him. God is on the loose, love is on the loose.

There is nowhere that God is not.

The women don’t encounter Jesus at the tomb where they expect to find him, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t also in places of death, that he isn’t with us in our tombs of grief and sorrow. The risen Jesus is there, even there, but not contained there.

When the angel rolls away the stone, Jesus doesn’t walk out then. He is already up, already out breaking the power of death, working new life. Stones cannot stop him. Death cannot stop him from being at work in our world.

Where is God? With us in places of death and fear AND already working on the other side of them. Even when God seems absent, God is alive and on the loose. Even when we cannot yet see how, God is already out, already working on the other side of all of this.

Do not be afraid. You are looking for Jesus; he is not here, he has been raised from the dead. Jesus is not contained here, not bound here or anywhere. He has been raised. AND, He is going ahead of you, there you will see him.

The angel tells the women, “He is going ahead of you to Galilea, there you will see him.” Galilea means home to them, everyday life. How astonishing to think they will find Jesus there! After all the turmoil the women have just experienced in Jerusalem, it must be strange to imagine that they will ever return to their everyday lives, much less encounter Jesus there. Yet, they are promised they will encounter Jesus in the place they call home, in the midst of everyday life.

This is the promise for you as well today.

Today Jesus is with you in your home – in that place where you now spend so much of your life.

Isolated in your home, separated from so many you love, you are never separated from Christ Jesus. Jesus is with you, even there, always there. And through him, we are united with those we love and long for, both in heaven and on earth. Amidst all the turmoil of this time, Jesus is with you.

Jesus is with you AND he is going ahead of you, just as the angel promised the women. Jesus is go- ing ahead of you into all that this life holds. This means that you also are not bound by fear and sorrow and death. This means that you can know great joy even amidst your fear.

That’s how the women left the tomb after all – we’re told they left with both fear and great joy. The angel’s promise, “He is going before you, there you will see him” – this set them free to follow Jesus joyfully even as they were afraid.

Jesus goes before you as well. You also are set free to follow Jesus, to love and serve and hope and give, even as joy and fear entwine within you. You can persist, you can carry on, you can keep the faith for Jesus goes ahead of you.

Where is God in these days? God made flesh in Jesus is everywhere present – in places of death and fear, in your home, at loose in the world. He is with you always, everywhere. He goes before you.

You can follow him joyfully even when you are afraid.

Jesus is not bound here. He has been raised. He goes ahead of you. There you will see him.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.

Palm Sunday – Online Worship
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
Decorah, Iowa
Rev. Amy Zalk Larson

Matthew 21:1- Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29, Matthew 26:6-13

Beloved of God, grace to you and peace in the name of Jesus.

Today in one breath, in one word, we have both praised and asked God for help. I’ve never before focused on how the praise word Hosanna means “save us.” It has never felt very relevant, but does it ever now. Save us, O God. Oh, how we need you now.

And yet, the other part of the word Hosanna – the way it is also an expression of praise – is just as important for us today.

It may seem jarring to praise in these times when each morning’s news is even harsher than yesterdays. It’s also so much harder to praise at home. Oh, how we wish we could be together waving palm branches, parading outside as children race up the sidewalk, singing together “All Glory Laud and Honor”.

Praise does not come easily in these days.

The book of Hebrews calls us to offer a “sacrifice of praise.” That phrase, a “sacrifice of praise”, is an acknowledgement that praise asks something of us, that it costs us something, that it takes some work. That is so true in these days of global pandemic.

And yet dear people of God, the act of praise also saves us. The act of praise saves us from despair, it saves us from the power of fear. It shapes us into people who can hope and sing and trust even in the face of deep sorrow.

Praise is a way of defying the power of suffering. Praise says to suffering – you do not have the last word. There is something deeper and truer. Life and love will ultimately prevail.

The crowds who accompanied Jesus into Jerusalem crying “Hosanna” were defying the power of suffering. They lived under oppressive Roman rule. They lived with no safety net, no health care system, no modern medicine. They lived each day wondering if they would have enough to eat, if they or their loved ones would be beaten, imprisoned or even killed by Rome. They could have been killed for praising someone other than the emperor and yet, they offered a sacrifice of praise to Jesus crying, “Hosanna, blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.”

Today we join our voices with them and with the whole communion of saints, the multitude of pilgrims throughout the ages who have chosen to praise in the face of suffering. Sometimes, pilgrims can gather to offer this praise; sometimes, for whatever reason, it is not safe to gather.

Today we also heard the story of an unnamed woman who offered her praise to Jesus in a smaller, more intimate setting. Her story assures us that even when we can’t gather with a large crowd, we too can still offer our own sacrifice of praise and adoration. This unnamed woman anointed Jesus’ head with costly perfume, a sacrificial act of devotion and love. Jesus’ disciples got angry about the waste saying, “This ointment could have been sold for a large sum and the money given to the poor.”

That is a common response to praise and worship especially amidst suffering. We wonder if it wouldn’t be better to spend our time and energy and resources in other ways to alleviate suffering. Worship seems like a waste. Yet Jesus affirms this woman’s sacrifice of praise – the good service she has done in tending to the body of Christ. He says whenever the good news is shared, what she has done is to be told in remembrance of her.

Jesus’ affirmation of this woman’s act of praise is sometimes misconstrued. His response, “You always have the poor with you,” has sometimes been taken to mean that we shouldn’t worry about the poor, that we should just worship and praise and ignore the needs of the suffering. Yet, Jesus is not saying that at all. He is saying followers of Jesus will always be with the poor, for that is what it means to follow Jesus. To follow Jesus is to be in community with those who are poor and suffering.

And when we are in community with those who know deep suffering, we often discover something powerful about the way the sacrifice of praise saves us. People who have survived disasters, wars, apartheid, genocide, those who live with poverty and hardship – they have much to teach us in these difficult days.

In her book, “A Witness”, Renee Splichal Larson tells of the night she spent in an open field after barely surviving the Haiti earthquake that killed her husband.

Renee had climbed out of the building that had collapsed around her, the building that was still collapsing, the building that still trapped her beloved Ben. She had nothing but the clothes on her back. It was cold. There were no blankets. There were bodies everywhere, people were dying all around her. The earth was still shaking with powerful aftershocks. Buildings were still crumbling.

The abiding image Renee has from that night is of a Haitian woman who sang praise to God all throughout that night. Amidst the chaos and the fear, the suffering and death, this woman sang unceasing praise, a powerful sacrifice of praise. The times she did need to stop and rest, someone else would pick up the song and sing praise until she could carry on.

As she sang praise, she proclaimed the truth that sustains so many suffering people, the truth that sustained Archbishop Desmund Tutu during apartheid in South Africa – the truth that goodness is stronger than evil, love is stronger than hate, light is stronger than darkness, life is stronger than death.

That image of the Haitian woman singing in the field helps me to understand the story of the un- named woman anointing Jesus’ head. Her singing through the night may have seemed to some like a waste of energy, a waste of breath, a pointless act when so many were in need of medical care and blankets and physical help. Yet, her sacrifice of praise saved many that night, pointing them to a deeper reality than the one unfolding before them. That woman’s singing saved and continues to save Renee and her family to this day.

The act of praise is a sacrifice, a sacrifice that also saves us, pointing us to a deeper reality that goodness, love, light and love will prevail.

So today, beloved, let’s raise our palms in praise to God. Raising our hands in praise is not something we’re used to doing as Lutherans, but let’s offer that sacrifice today. I encourage you to raise your palms as we sing our Hymn of the Day and our Sending Song today. After worship take a
picture of yourself raising your palms in praise and email it to me or share it with me on Facebook.

And today, let’s also offer love and devotion to the body of Christ in a more intimate way by tending to our own hands. Our hands are such important parts of the body of Christ. Our hands are making the love of Christ known even in these times of physical distancing. We are using our hands to call neighbors and loved ones, to write and type messages of hope and support, to stay connected to one another. Many are using their hands to package groceries, to pick up deliveries for others, to tend the sick. We are washing our hands and wearing gloves in order to try to avoid getting sick ourselves, but also in order to flatten the curve of the virus and not overwhelm our health care system. Our hands are getting raw and chapped as we wash them so often.

Today, let’s show some love and care for our hands by taking some lotion and anointing our hands with it as the woman anointed Jesus’ body with ointment. As you anoint your hands, I will offer you a blessing of love and devotion for your hands and your whole body – the body which is part of the body of Christ on earth.

 Blessing the Body

This blessing takes
one look at you
and all it can say is
holy.

Holy hands.
Holy face.
Holy feet.
Holy everything
in between.

Holy even in pain.
Holy even when weary.
In brokenness, holy.
In shame, holy still.

Holy in delight.
Holy in distress.
Holy when being born.
Holy when we lay it down
at the hour of our death.

So, friend,
open your eyes
(holy eyes).
For one moment
see what this blessing sees,
this blessing that knows
how you have been formed
and knit together
in wonder and
in love.

Welcome this blessing
that folds its hands
in prayer
when it meets you;
receive this blessing
that wants to kneel
in reverence
before you:
you who are
temple,
sanctuary,
home for God
in this world.

—Jan Richardson

As you raise the palms of your hands today in offering praise, as you wash your hands, as you use your hands to care for others know that your hands are Christ’s hands, your body is a temple of God’s presence.

Use your hands and your body today to offer a saving, sacrifice of praise. And today may you know deep in your bones the truth that goodness is stronger the evil, love is stronger than hate, light is stronger than darkness, life is stronger than death.

Let’s take a moment for silent prayer.