Dear Friends,
We are coming towards the end of these weeks of Eastertide. On Thursday we celebrated the feast of the Ascension and these week’s attachments relate to these days of Ascensiontide. It is quite a mysterious happening & maybe there will be a word or phrase within one of the readings that helps you to an insight into it.
Our blessing this week is from Heavenly Peace, ‘The Peace of Christ be with you’. Let’s pray once again for areas of conflict – those at a distance (Ukraine, Afghanistan, the DRC, Sudan,) but also those closer to home, perhaps in our families, amongst our friends ………….
Love to you all
Advance notice for those who come to Evening Prayer (zoomed or live):
From Thursday 25 May until Sunday 4th June inclusive there will be no zoomed EP. Also, for those who join us in the Blessed Sacrament church, we won’t be there for EP on Tuesday 30 or Wed 31 May.
Ascension Thursday
Caryl Micklem
Ascended Lord, Jesus,
Once you lived a human life
subject to the limitations of time:
now you are the same yesterday, today & for ever.
Once you were limited to one particular place:
now you are present wherever people turn to you.
Once only those who met you face to face knew you:
now your divine love extends through all the world.
Jesus, ascended Lord of time and space,
love as wide as life – we thank you!
When we stand gazing upwards, bring us down to earth:
with the love of a friend
through the songs of the sorrowing
in the faces of the hungry.
When we look to you for action, demand some work from us:
by your touch of fire
your glance of reproof
your fearful longing.
As ruler over all:
love us into action;
fire us with your zeal;
enrich us with your grace
to make us willing subjects of your rule. Amen.
Janet Nightingale
Sensible men,
men with their feet
planted on the ground
who are, they say, objective,
not given to dallying
in a fool’s paradise,
not influenced by shades
or the gossamer world of dreams,
substantial men
who recognise what is tangible,
solid, concrete, palpable,
such men
would be dismayed to learn
that the only reality is spirit.
The spirit was
before matter existed.
The spirit is
while matter decays.
The spirit will be
when every part of matter
has become dust
scattered by the wind of the spirit,
or reshaped by the sign of his breath.
Without the spirit
matter has no meaning.
Without the spirit
there is no meaning.
We preach what is nonsense
to the sensible man,
impossible to the rational mind.
We preach Jesus Christ,
who, for love of us,
lived, suffered, was crucified
and rose from the dead,
who is Lord of life & death,
time and space,
matter and spirit.
And we who knew him
in Galilee and Judea,
sometimes witnessed, without understanding,
moments when there seemed to be
a confusion between matter and spirit.
Moments when his reality astonished us.
And we flounder when we look for words
to describe what no human eye
has ever seen.
Such as the day we call
the day of his Ascension.
And the sun seemed to flare,
as if a mist had cleared his face,
lighting the clouds, blinding white,
as white as when he was transfigured.
And was he lifted up?
Or did the very mountain shrink beneath his feet,
humbled by his magnificence?
Open-mouthed we stared
as those dazzling clouds enfolded him
in splendour beyond imagining.
The King of Kings
ascending his throne
with glory dancing in our eyes,
and in our ears silent hallelujahs
harmonising, mingling with his words –
You –
you shall be my witnesses –
my witnesses to the end of the earth,
Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
Writer unknown