Lent 2026: Gracing the Days
The Gathered Reflections
20 // Stay Awhile!
'Surely the Lord is in this place ...' Genesis 28.16
* * *
Good morning!
I only meant to sit on my folding chair in the garden for a few minutes (as I’d suggested at the foot of yesterday’s reflection) - but it became more.
The moment I unfolded the chair, a ‘ping’ came from a friend who was sending me a picture of a similar one positioned in a desert! Serendipity. A call to pay attention. Grace flows between us in community. Or unfolds, let’s say.
It wasn’t an especially nice day to start my garden practice - cold and a bit damp. But it became, for me personally, an invitation to healing, as I sensed, deep in my soul, how (after nearly two years) I could now sit here once more without the crash and rumble of builders surrounding us.
It can be hard for any of us to be ‘here’ - whether just for a few moments, or indeed for a season. But that’s OK; the day comes. As the farmer-poet Wendell Berry writes in this micro-poem:
‘There is a day
When the road neither
Comes nor goes, and the way
Is not a way but a place.’
How comforting, from one who knows.
The nesting box in the tree came under investigation by a pair of birds seeking their place, this spring. Elsewhere, a robin rejoiced unceasingly. And the ground beneath my feet seemed to whisper, “Stay awhile, we’ve missed you.”
* * *
When I returned to my study, Marion had sent me a poem, ‘Camas Lilies’ by Lynn Ungar. I’m familiar with it, as you might be, too - but it helps greatly to be reminded. After all, seeds, I’m remembering, may need time, and the watering of grace, before they stir:
‘And you - what of your rushed
and useful life? Imagine setting it all down -
papers, plans, appointments, everything -
leaving only a note: “Gone
to the fields to be lovely. Be back
when I’m through with blooming.”'
* * *
I wonder if Jesus left a note when he went to the desert. When he set out to practice being ‘here’, more fully than any of us have ever been ... so that in those times when we do come 'here' too, we may find him, being lovely, and whispering, "Stay awhile."
Perhaps the very definition of being here is simply coming to realise, like Jacob, that 'the Lord is in this place', and here is where we find him.
* * *
May grace unfold, today.
Go well!
Brian
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Gracing the Days
* A happy St Patrick's Day to one and all, especially our very dear Irish friends. It seems entirely fitting and in keeping with today's reflection to listen, now, to this exquisite version of the Deer's Cry (Patrick's prayer). Imagine we're all sitting on folding chairs together, as we do! Music by Arvo Part, performed by The Sixteen, arr Harry Christophers.
Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down,
Christ in me, Christ when I arise,
Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me,
Christ in the eye that sees me,
Christ in the ear that hears me,
Christ with me.
Carry the prayer with you. Why not set your alarm for later in the day to listen again, and to pray the words, and to stay keenly aware of the divine Presence.
* Here is Lynn Ungar's poem 'Camas Lilies'.
* As I mentioned yesterday, the garden practice comes from Simon Barnes' book The Year of Sitting Dangerously. Take a chair to the garden or find a bench and return 'here' daily, if you can.
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19 // Super-Blooming Marvellous!
‘The desert will rejoice, and flowers will bloom in the wastelands.’ Isaiah 35
* * *
Good morning!
Even in the most barren of global landscapes, signs of hope can lift the heart and stir the soul. Right now, the hottest and driest place on earth, the aptly named Death Valley, has burst into life with a ‘super bloom’ of wild flowers.
In its most vivid display for a decade, the desert is 'transformed and covered in golden and violet flora’, says the BBC. You can almost hear it 'rejoicing', in the words of Isaiah. Beauty calls.
Last autumn, unusually heavy rain soaked the seeds which had lain dormant in the dusty ground for years, washing off their protective coatings and preparing a way in the wilderness for this divine spring spectacle.
Lord, please soak our hidden seeds.
* * *
It can all seem like a miracle, flowers in the wilderness - and yet of course those seeds were there waiting all along, some for many years. Just as the words of Isaiah are planted like seeds in the Bible: 'the desert will bloom'.
In our own life, perhaps we await not so much a miracle, then, as the natural fulfilment of a promise, baked in as surely as the Death Valley heat. Streams will flow, buds will burst.
* * *
But as usual with God, we get to play our part.
The Death Valley display reminds me (so fondly!) of our Lent series two years ago - 'The Desert Will Bloom' - in which many seeds (I pray) were scattered, some of which may still be waiting to germinate.
I especially loved one image we shared: of carrying metaphorical folding chairs into the desert of our own and each other’s experience, and sitting together in a makeshift circle, maybe round a fire.
It was inspired by the theologian Ada María Isasi-Díaz, who loved to speak of the ‘kin-dom’ of God. When her church in Harlem was closed down, she led prayer meetings on the pavement in creative protest with parishioners. It became ‘a neighbourhood institution, complete with folding chairs and tent’.
Those in their chairs - who happened to be a cross section of the poor and marginalised - remind me of flowers in the desert; remind me we can all be flowers. For when we share together in uncertainty, disruption, sorrow, or joy, doesn’t God somehow release a flow of grace like living water?
* * *
The Christian author Kate Bowler touches on this. She writes with refreshing honesty about the desert of uncertainty which stage-4 cancer drew her into. Mercifully, she’s in remission, but she swears a bit more as a result. ('I read an article which said that people in grief swear because they feel the English language has reached its limit in a time of inarticulate sorrow,' she says.)
I'm reminded that we need not romanticise grace, nor shield it from life's utter rawness. She feels guilty, she says, for leaning on a friend who has suffered too - yet it's a lifeline. "I'm so sorry," she told her friend. "You live with an uncertain future and what may or may not happen. Yet you live here with me, and - I’m so sorry - but I’m so ------- grateful to have you here.”
* * *
Another seed we planted two years ago was that the desert need not be a fearful void - such as the one in Genesis before the world was made - but a ‘God space’ we share, through the sorrow, the joy, the pain, the hope. I love to think God takes a folding chair out there with us too.
As Lent unfolds, then, and even as we keep watch ‘out there’ for signs of life, let’s believe we can be the signs for each other. Refreshed by the living water which flows like grace from God between us. Souls stirring, like seeds.
All of which, maybe, is a polite way of saying what Kate Bowler expresses more boldly - that there’s something about being here together on shared ground that is truly super-blooming marvellous.
* * *
May we take heart, today.
Go well!
Brian
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Gracing the Days
* Two years ago this became something of a theme song for our series: Jon Foreman’s wonderful song ‘In Bloom’. May it be our prayer, today.
* Watch this news clip from the BBC about the super-bloom here.
Micro-Sabbath Mondays
In Simon Barnes' book The Year of Sitting Dangerously: My Garden Safari, he describes how he formed a practice of taking a fold-up chair into his garden to sit still for a few minutes, rain or shine, every day for a year, to wait and watch.
Why not resolve, for the rest of Lent, to take a fold-up chair into the garden (if you have one) for five minutes each day - otherwise, a nearby bench? - to sit with God and watch spring leaves and flowers coming into bloom. Or at least create a 'micro-sabbath' space in your day, today.
You might use this time, too, to pray for, or reach out, to someone who shares the ground with you, and let God's grace flow like living water.
Plus:
* Keep going with the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* You can catch up with Friday's Live at Five here.
* Don't forget to enjoy the super-bloom of last week's RSVPs - on the usual page here!
* You can watch my conversation with Martin Wroe here. Thanks for all your kind comments.
Credits
Simon Barnes, The Year of Sitting Dangerously: My Garden Safari (Simon & Schuster, 2023)
Kate Bowler's can be found at katebowler.com.
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18 // To Break Out in Grace
'Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!' 2 Corinthians 5.17
* * *
Good morning!
And a happy 'flickering Friday' to you, as we seek to pass the light from one to another, today, and bring God's life-light to the world around us. Why don't we start by 'breathing' the first part of the compass prayer, in order to settle in:
breathe in: "The Lord ..."
breathe out: " ... is my Shepherd."
breathe in: "You ..."
breathe out: " ... are my Shepherd."
breathe in: "I ..."
breathe out: " ... shall not want."
* * *
Remember what it felt like as a teenager when you had a break-out of spots? It could feel as if the whole world was staring, judging. As if that world itself was a pretty awful place to be. And I'm sure we carry a wary self-consciousness with us deep into adulthood. But imagine if we could break out in grace, instead!
I've been thinking, as I was intrigued to hear the leadership psychologist Shadé Zahrai yesterday describing what's called the 'Dartmouth Scar Experiment' from the 1980s, in which two groups of people were sent out to speak to strangers.
One half were the control group, who went just as they were. The others bore a realistic scar, which had been drawn across their face by a make-up artist. They were shown the scar in a hand mirror before they then went out to socialise.
When those with the scars returned, they reported feeling tense, judged, and stared at. It had adversely affected their conversations in a way that the 'control' participants did not, of course, report.
And yet: what the scarred people didn't know was that just before they went out (and after they’d looked in the mirror), the make-up artist had asked to ‘seal’ their scar using a moisturising lotion, so it wouldn’t crack - but instead they deliberately removed it entirely. So each face was unmarked from the start!
* * *
The psychological upshot is that the way we see ourselves changes how we see the world - and how we act within it - echoing yesterday's wisdom from Martin Wroe, who said that ‘we don’t see things as they are, but as we are …’
Those who believed they had a scar felt the weight and stigma of it without ever needing to. They had already been 'wiped clean'.
* * *
Grace, I’m sure, defies too many tight definitions, but when I heard this story, I caught another glimpse. Don’t we tend to act as if we still bear the marks of what we might call sin, when Jesus has already removed them, forgiven us, taken away our shame? I know I do.
* * *
Of course, real scars of all sorts - physical, emotional, mental - by their nature take a long time to heal. And Jesus bore his own scars most graciously and knows just what it is for others to come face to face with them. We live within the now-but-not-yet creative tension of our own story, in which grace is already given, yet healing is still unfolding.
Nevertheless: the promise flickers past like the glimpse of a brimstone butterfly on the first warm day of spring - reminding us that we, too, will be made new. That every tear will be wiped away. And that in one very profound dimension, the work is already done because of the deepest love of Jesus. 'It is finished.'
* * *
It may be easier to believe that scars are present when they’re not. But what the Dartmouth Scar Experiment tells me is that our perception of ourselves - and thus the world - can truly start to be transformed by the gift of grace!
Theologically, it's not about the power of positive thinking, so much as our willingness to receive God's grace - and to accept that we are loved, forgiven, restored, with the promise of new life.
To look in the mirror, smile, and dare to step outside today with the lightness of a brimstone. To see ourselves as we really are: part of the breath-taking beauty of God's in-breaking kingdom, and God's out-breaking grace.
And yes: to see how this wonderful world might light up, as we do!
* * *
May you break out in grace, this weekend.
Go well!
Brian
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Live at Five! 5pm GMT, YouTube
* It's the fourth of our 'Live at Five' sessions tonight, on YouTube, at 5pm (GMT)! A chance to meet in real time, light a candle, practice some stillness, review the week's reflections, and share in the chat. Please join me by clicking here just before 5pm. Or you can watch later!
Gracing the Days
* Thank you to David M for suggesting this prayerful piece of music, 'Kyrie Eleison (Deus Genitor Alme)', by Juliano Ravanello. (It means, 'Lord have mercy, nurturing Father'.)
* Remember to watch my conversation with Martin Wroe here. Thanks for all your kind comments.
* Do take a chance this weekend to enjoy the astonishing riches of the community's prayerful and creative responses - on the RSVP page here!
* And you can find the Lent Compass Prayer here. Keep it going!
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16 // Prayer is Who We Are
'Pray without ceasing.' (1 Thessalonians 5.17)
* * *
Good morning!
And a peaceful 'Wellspring Wednesday' to you.
‘We can live without a great deal,' writes the storyteller Martin Shaw, in his brilliant new book Liturgies of the Wild. 'But to live without prayer would leave us lesser human beings. Prayer changes our relationship with everything.’
Martin is mercifully unconventional - soaked in the outdoors, yet steeped in prayerfulness, leading regular wilderness quests and kickstarting his own Christian awakening, back in the day, with a 101-day stint in Dartmoor forest.
We don’t have 101 days to play with here, but we do have just more than half of Lent in which to turn grace into action through daily practice. As Shaw himself says, ‘In the end, prayer isn’t something we do; it becomes who we are.’
So I wanted to share three snippets I've appreciated from his inspiring chapter on prayer (and after, a circle prayer of my own as a creative response).
* * *
First, a fresh insight:
Shaw found a home in the Orthodox Church, and in the eastern mind, he says, all the saints are gathered happily with Christ when we pray. 'It’s lively and bustling,' he says, 'even when we ourselves may be praying alone in a bedsit or on a moonlit hill. We are buoyed and surrounded.’
It’s something I’ve never quite pictured in that way before. Why not revel in that communal bustle, today.
Second, an ancient practice:
Shaw offers first-hand wisdom on finding a place of deep inner stillness through the Jesus Prayer, ‘Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me.’
It's a prayer of ‘beautiful contrition’, he says, describing how we can kneel (literally or figuratively!) in the ‘millennia-weathered grooves of other pilgrims’ prostrations’. Another act of communion with those who have gone before us.
And here’s what I love: we find this stillness ‘when the mind is nested in the terrain of the heart'. What imagery to help us rest the restless mind and go deeper in. He sits in a darkened room, settles in, takes some breaths, then starts to repeat the prayer.
After a few minutes, it starts to feel as if the words are being spoken through him, he says, and coming from his heart. ‘The prayer rests there, like a pulse.’
Third, a physical act - 'Crossing'
For me, this is a lovely challenge, as I've never practiced it! Making the sign of the cross, or ‘Signum Crucis’, as it's called. It's body prayer, really (I've put extra notes below), moving your hand from head, to gut, to shoulders, to the heart, slowly and gracefully. It signifies a 'Crossing', from the mundane to the sacred. A ‘discernment of grace’. A way of entering the world in embrace.
It's 'the big sweep,' he says, 'the love gesture. A meeting with Heavenly Earth.' And his wild, joined-up vision feels restorative. 'Within it would be far distant mountains, antelope tracks ... a thousand bad decisions, fessed up ... fur and wing, star and sea. Within it would be homeless shelters, food banks, and the desperately lost.’
Crossing, then, is at once an act of attention, a deepening of heart, an entering in, and as he so wonderfully puts it, a ‘warm stabling for all’.
* * *
Such ways of prayer feel so dynamically communal, even from a place of solitude; and so outward-looking, even from the place of deepest inner stillness.
All of which makes me hungry to experience more, as we press in to the second half of Lent with each other, and with that lively bustle of the saints. How thrilling, to be part of that number! To feel the pulse of God's love within us. To be a place of 'crossing' in our troubled world. To become the prayer.
* * *
May we be 'buoyed and surrounded', today.
Go well!
Brian
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Wellspring Wednesday!
As it's a Wellspring Wednesday, I've sought to offer my own creative response here in the form of a circle prayer. Use your hand to trace a circle in front of you as you pray it, or turn in a circle with your hand out to trace it. I offer this as a prayer of blessing and protection to you and the community, in the tradition of the Celtic 'caim' or 'circling' prayers.
The Circle of Grace
With this circle ...
I trace (for us)
God’s love
like a ring -
eternity's token
of a promise
that never is broken.
I trace
the circling beauty of sunset
and moon-rise,
and the Creator’s embrace
of us each
under wondering skies;
I trace
the thorny rim
of a crown
from which
sorrow and love
flow mingling down.
I trace
the line of God’s face
which shines life-light
on ours and
floods us with
grace upon grace.
Amen.
...
RSVP now open!
Today's the day! And while you're welcome to follow the usual format, I've a suggestion: given all the turbulence in the world right now, why not offer your creative response - pictures, photos, poems, craft works, however you'd like to do it - as a form of prayer. Let's see the RSVPs this week as one beautiful communal creative act of prayer itself, in whatever form suits you best.
Please keep it concise and simple in format. And send it by replying to this email. As usual, there's no pressure to participate at all.
They'll go up slowly, but steadily enough, on the RSVP page here!
Plus:
* Making the sign of the Cross (in the Orthodox tradition!):
With your right hand, bring your thumb and first two fingers together as 'one', to represent the Trinity - while tucking in the other two fingers, to represent the two natures of Jesus, human and divine.
Starting at your head (our conscious beholding of God), move your hand down to your gut (hunger, depth, Incarnation, earthedness), then to the right shoulder, then the left (signifying God’s power in you). Do this three times over, slowly. To finish, you could then rest your hand on your heart. Do this as an intentional way of 'Crossing' from mundane to the sacred, wherever you are, today.
* You can read a good interview with Martin here via Common Good magazine.
* Prayer for the Middle East - there was a beautiful online gathering last night facilitated by Krish Kandiah and Guli Francis-Dehqani (the Iranian-born Bishop of Chelmsford). It featured several people in trouble spots around the world and felt truly connective. You may like to have a look here (it lasted for about 1.5 hours) - but if you do one thing, have a listen to the song which was shared by the Brilliance called 'We Need Help'. It's based on Psalm 46, and you'll find it if you scroll along to 1hour 10 minutes 48 seconds. (Thanks to Joy H for tipping me off last night!)
* And you can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
Credits
Martin Shaw, Liturgies of the Wild: Myths That Make Us (Penguin, 2026)
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15 // Heaven's Scent
'The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.' John 12.3
* * *
Good morning!
I wonder, which smell truly transports you?
And where does it transport you to?
* * *
It's amazing how smells can transport us so quickly, often way back to our beginnings. Floor polish takes me straight to the school assembly hall. New shoes, to the first day of term - and all the feelings that came with it!
Fascinatingly, scientists suggest that up to 75 per cent of our daily emotions are influenced by smell. That's quite something. It might explain why it felt so disorienting for many of us who lost our sense of smell during Covid.
And why smell is such a gift, which can take us further than just 'back', to somewhere we can't quite place. Heavenly wafts of fresh-cut grass, ground coffee, warm bread, blossom on the spring air, the sea - they can all carry us with a soulful yearning to somewhere hazily half-recalled in our spiritual DNA.
As if the scent of Eden itself still lingers on the breeze-dried clothes of Creation.
* * *
I was intrigued to read this week of a project which is bringing back scents of plants and flowers that are now extinct. With DNA gathered from old botanical collections and the tools of biotechnology, scientists and perfumers have been working together to resurrect (or ‘scent-surrect’) aromas which have long since been lost to deforestation and climate change. How moving!
One fragrance, which they named ‘Floating Forest’, evokes a tree from Borneo - Shorea cuspidata - which grew up to 100 feet tall in tropical forests, but was made extinct through logging. Another, ‘Solar Canopy’, summons the sweet and fruity essence of the Hibiscadelphus wilderianus, a relative of the hibiscus that once graced Hawaii’s southern slopes.
The scents are approximations, but they evoke a felt and moving sense of what we have lost from Creation's rich palette. And a reminder to wake up and smell what we still have, here, to savour.
* * *
Smell matters, then, to our active engagement with Creation care - as it must to the whole of the Christian story.
We still have access to nard and myrrh, but I realised I’d never properly smelled either, until I recently experienced a communion service led by Manchester's Methodist Superintendent, Joanne Cox-Darling. She used an array of perfumed strips - orange and bergamot, fig and honey, frankincense, nard and myrrh - to bring back to life the fragrance of the Christian story.
All of which brought home to me how rich the sensory world of God's presence is, and how smell can awaken so much of our felt response.
* * *
Nard - lavished on Jesus’ feet by Mary of Bethany - is notably persistent as a fragrance. It stays on you. And as I pondered how that burial scent must have stayed on him as he set off, on foot, for Jerusalem, I sensed not just God’s love for humanity, but humanity’s love for God, through Mary’s heart-felt act. How moved must Jesus have been; how loved must he have felt, to breathe it in.
Perhaps all these heavenly, earthy smells are drawing us, in the end, to the place where divine love co-mingles with ours. Smell the coffee! Smell the blossom! Smell the sea air! Just as fragrance lingers after a warm embrace, so the ‘aroma of Christ’, as Paul calls it, can stay with us, on us, to grace the day.
And that is surely heaven’s scent.
* * *
May we carry the fragrance.
Go well!
Brian
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Gracing the Days
* This is a lovely instrumental piece of music called 'Petrichor', by Keaton Henson. Petrichor is the term for the earthy smell after rain. Let it evoke in you any of your favourite smells, as you relax with God for a few moments, now.
* Savour the aromas, today. Take a mindful walk, and be intentional about smelling different fragrances. Invite them to help you make prayerful, loving connection with Creation and the Creator.
* Here's a short prayer from George MacLeod, founder of the modern Iona community:
"Almighty God, Creator: the morning is Yours, rising into fullness ...
Eternity is Yours, dipping into time.
The vibrant grasses, the scent of flowers, the lichen on the rocks, the tang of seaweed, all are Yours.
Gladly we live in this garden of Your creating.
Thank you.
Amen."
*You can read more about the extinct-flower fragrance project, as well as watch a fascinating 5-minute film about an art project which accompanied it, here: 'Resurrection of the Sublime'.
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14 // Now Here Is My Secret
‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ (2 Corinthians 12.9)
* * *
Good morning!
Here’s one of the most beautiful stories I’ve heard first-hand - and reminds me that miracles really do happen.
A dear friend was trapped for years in a hellish spiral of multiple addictions (they had their reasons). They’d exhausted almost every option, consulted with eminent professionals, entered multiple rehabs, and become as knowledgeable about their struggles as the experts - yet with no lasting joy.
Almost as an after-thought, they finally tried an AA meeting in a dusty local hall - lit by fluorescent strip-lights and graced by a group of the most honest, non-judgmental, pared back and lovingly powerless people. And there, my friend was introduced to the ‘twelve step’ programme, admitted they were powerless over addiction, and surrendered to a 'higher power' - which for them is God.
This did, intriguingly, mean loosening the limits of who they'd believed God to be. They called out to the higher power who lay beyond the scope of their comprehension, and surrendered to the mystery. An encounter with God followed, along with an undefinable sense of peace, and joy, I'm told.
Richard Rohr reflects on this kind of process in Breathing Under Water (his exploration of the spiritual wisdom of the twelve steps). Recovery often begins, he says, when we loosen our grip on our inherited ideas about God, and open ourselves to the possibility of encounter with God’s presence.
Ever since, taking it very gently - and only ever one day at a time - my friend remains clean, sober and wakefully alive, despite challenges. How beautiful.
* * *
All of which shines a light into my own life, and I can see afresh how often I’m trying to prove to myself that I have my life 'together', or that I can do this on my own, or that I’ve somehow worked God out. But I don't have to.
The invitation arrives to us all, I’m sure, to realise that we are, at our best, powerless; and in our failing and falling, we are somehow held and lifted, as if honesty is the doorway to that dusty hall through which grace enters.
As Paul writes, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’
* * *
It was World Book Day last week, which made me reflect on the books I’ve appreciated most. And there’s a page that my heart returned to, in Douglas Coupland’s collection of stories Life After God. He’s not a Christian, as such, but his soulful, honestly relatable fiction offered up this oft-quoted, much-loved passage in the Nineties. It moves me to recollect it. You may remember it:
'Now - here is my secret:
I tell it to you with an openness of heart that I doubt I shall ever achieve again, so I pray that you are in a quiet room as you hear these words.
My secret is that I need God—that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem to be capable of giving; to help me be kind, as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love, as I seem beyond being able to love.'
* * *
It’s not to say we shouldn’t seek to change, but that we can only really start healing from this point of ground zero, from where we begin to see more clearly the face of the unexpected God who stoops to meet us, lowest down. And where we see each other’s faces in those holy fluorescent strip-lights of pure honesty. For beyond pretence and persona, surely, lies the presence.
* * *
The Serenity Prayer has long accompanied the twelve steps, and perhaps it can be ours to hold this week.
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.
And as I give thanks for the stories that bring me to life, it strikes me that what feels so joyously miraculous may yet be something simpler: real life, at its most honest and graced, and lived only ever a day at a time.
* * *
May we know God's presence today.
Go well!
Brian
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Micro-Sabbath Mondays
* Here's a lovely piece called 'Sing Gently', by Eric Whitacre - written during the pandemic as a choral reflection on human vulnerability and kindness.
May we sing together, always
May our voice be soft
May our singing be music for others
And may it keep others aloft
Sing, sing gently, always
Sing, sing as one (as one)
May we stand (may we stand) together, always
May our voice be strong
May we hear the singing and
May we always sing along (along)
Sing, sing gently, always
Sing, sing as one (as one)
Singing gently as one
* On 'Micro-Sabbath Mondays', we try to bring the goodness of sabbath rest into the 'rest' of the week. Reflect on one thing that brought you inspiration, rest, reconnection or life at the weekend, and try to bring its essence into your day, today. Why not set your alarm to take one specific, 'diaried' bit of time out to positively disrupt the flow of your day and to breathe deep.
* Here's a really helpful compendium of reflections on the Twelve Step Program from Richard Rohr's CAC.
* If you haven't watched Friday's 'Live at Five', you can do so here. Thanks if you stuck with me on the day through a couple of false starts!
* You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* And do remember to enjoy last week's RSVPs here.
Credits
Richard Rohr, Breathing Under Water (SPCK, 2018)
Douglas Coupland, Life After God (Simon & Schuster, 1994)
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12 // Tend and Befriend
'When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. John 19.26-27
* * *
Good morning!
Fight or flight. They're the terms we often speak of when life gets stressful. When the pressure rises, we brace for battle or look for the nearest exit. But is that really the only choice of response we have?
No, says the psychologist Shelley Taylor, whose research finds that stress doesn't need to divide and isolate us. In fact, it can draw us together, through a response she calls ‘tend and befriend’. ‘Tend’, as in protecting, nurturing and calming vulnerable people such as children, family and community; ‘befriend’, as in seeking connection, cooperation and social support.
It’s a predominantly female response, she says, in contrast with the more typically masculine, adrenaline-fuelled 'fight or flight'. Caring for others and forming supportive relationships can reduce stress biologically, partly through bonding hormones such as oxytocin.
We can calm each other's nervous systems just by being present.
Perhaps we can see Mary’s visit to Elizabeth in their pregnancies as a way of making such bonds in a potentially stressful context. How moving, the soul connection formed between the mothers and their unborn babies; how hopeful, the companionship and mutual strengthening; how creative, the song that issued from Mary’s heart.
* * *
Happily for the men among us, ‘tend and befriend’ can be learned, practiced, and isn’t automatically 'female'. I guess you only have to think of Jesus.
Under the utmost stress of the cross, he looks down at the heart-pierced Mary and asks his friend John to take her as his mother. Jesus tends and befriends the thief on the cross, and forgives his tormentors. He brings only grace to a gunfight. A life spent leaning in to love.
* * *
That’s not to say we shouldn't have strong and clear boundaries. In the desert, Jesus sent the devil away with quiet authority. He was forever leaving the crowds and retreating to solitary places for his daily bread. He was not a people pleaser nor a doormat, and neither does he call us to be.
Yet our own spiritual practice, like his, can help us to pause before fighting or fleeing automatically. If stress rises today - in a triggering email or argument, a troubling news story, or through your own inner critic - try pausing for breath. Count to ten, even. And ask yourself:
What could it look like to tend and befriend this moment?
Perhaps it's calming someone.
Perhaps it's seeking support.
Perhaps it's being kind and gentle with yourself.
And surely it's tending and befriending God, too, who doesn't flee the scene or draw the sword, but draws near to us with the grace of presence. I think of Mary, staying at the cross to tend Jesus all the way to the bitter-sweet end, and beyond - even as he tended her, with such love.
* * *
May we tend and befriend, today.
Go well!
Brian
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Gracing the Days
* Have a listen to Ola Gjeilo’s 'Ubi Caritas', which carries the refrain, 'Where charity and love are, God is there. Christ’s love has gathered us into one.' It's traditionally associated with the washing of feet on Maundy Thursday. This version by Voces 8. Imagine Jesus washing your feet, as you listen.
* Thank you for your wonderful RSVPs, which have created a compendium of artistry and wisdom far greater than the sum of our parts! I'm still uploading a few. Keep checking back, then, and please do savour all the RSVPs here.
* You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
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Credits
Shelley Taylor, The Tending Instinct: How Nurturing Is Essential for Who We Are and How We Live (Henry Holt, 2003)
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13 // Grace is in the Air
‘The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you.’ Numbers 6.24-26
* * *
Good morning!
Fiery sunsets. 'Blood rain'. An eerie atmosphere hangs in the skies above the UK, all right - but it's not (necessarily) a sign of the end times, despite what's been happening in the Middle East and elsewhere. Instead, it’s a vast plume of Saharan desert dust drifting, softening the sunlight, slowly settling.
And so, while wars and rumours of war burst from the troubled hearts of men, this dust provides a surprising - dare I say heavenly - reminder of the nature of God. One that’s most appropriate for Lent, where Jesus, in humility, sits it out in the desert, his feet planted lovingly. ‘Remember, you are dust.’
* * *
In his autobiography, Carl Jung recounts a story which he once heard:
‘A student came to a rabbi and said, “In the olden days there were men who saw the face of God. Why don’t they any more?” To which the rabbi replied, “Because nowadays no one can stoop so low.”’
Growing down may be a deeper spiritual movement than growing up. And the moral of Jung's story seems to be that if we do, if we come back down to earth in times like Lent, we find God gracing us here upon this holy dusty ground.
* * *
The Hebrew word for ‘grace’ hints at this ‘stooping low’. It first appears in Genesis (6.8) when ‘Noah found grace in the eyes of God’, and the word used is hen, from the verb hanan, meaning to be gracious, to show favour, and to bend down in kindness or compassion.
It’s less an abstract principle than an action; less an idea than a movement.
Meanwhile, the Greek word for grace is charis, meaning gift, delight or beauty. Woven together with the Hebrew, we might say that grace is the gift of the God who delights in giving himself so beautifully.
Grace is Jesus, stooping to write in the sand before a dis-graced woman and a graceless mob. Grace is God on bended knee to wash our feet. Grace lays Jesus low upon the Cross to lift him high for all to see.
* * *
And if we wish to spread this freeing flow of love, to be part of the movement, of course we must receive it, first. Let him grace us. Meet him where he meets us, so that we can meet one another in this same Spirit.
(breathe in) "Grace /
(breathe out) "upon grace."
It may mean we have to bend our knee like him, but here is where we see the face of God, according to the story. In the eyes of a child, perhaps. Or in someone who needs our help. Or someone who seeks mercy.
* * *
The red skies and ‘blood rain’ right now may seem achingly resonant with the war-torn wounds of humanity - as well, indeed, with the sorrow and love which flow mingled down to spatter the earth beneath the cross.
Yet the filter in the sky this week is dust. And dust is where the grace begins. God stoops not just to remember we are dust, but to become it with us. What gift, indeed! The best kind of news, which takes time, like Lent, like dust, to settle. There's something in the air all right, and it looks, to me, like grace.
* * *
May the Lord make his face shine upon you,
and be gracious to you.
Go well!
Brian
(Do join me for 'Live at Five' tonight on YouTube - details below!)
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Gracing the Days
* I've shared this before, but I do love Hannah Peel's Sunrise Through the Dusty Nebula. It's a piece that feels like light breaking through dust. As you listen, think of Jesus in the dust of the desert, watching the sun rise. And then imagine the face of God shining graciously upon you.
TODAY! Live at Five - 5pm GMT, YouTube
* It's the third of our 'Live at Five' sessions tonight, on YouTube, at 5pm (GMT)! A chance to meet in real time, light a candle, practice some stillness, review the week's reflections, and share in the chat. Please join me by clicking here just before 5pm. (Or you can watch later!)
* Last week, I wondered aloud whether we could find an alliteration for Fridays to go with Micro-Sabbath Mondays and Wellspring Wednesdays. Seeing as we light a candle together during Live at Five, how about Flickering Fridays? I love the thought of us passing the light of Christ between us throughout the week, and celebrating this together on Fridays in candlelit communion!
So whether you can join me or not tonight, why not pause to light a candle, and welcome the light we share between us each week. Reflect on one thing that you will carry with you into the weekend like a flickering flame of hope.
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* You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* Thank you for your wonderful RSVPs, which feel like some of the richest I've ever had the privilege to receive and upload. It's incredible to be part of the flow of this community. Please do enjoy the RSVPs here, including Elly's wonderful fiery sunset, below. Here's to grace.
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11 // Be Still and Flow
'Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may have her young — a place near your altar ...' (Ps 84.3)
* * *
Good morning!
And a happy 'Wellspring Wednesday' to you! I wonder what's rising from the hidden depths of your soul, today. What kind of daily bread may arrive from that glorious place of alignment and flow with the constantly creating God?
* * *
I'm delighted to share with you a photograph today, to reflect on as 'Visio Divina', just to mix things up! It comes with love from the esteemed landscape photographer (and Christian) Paul Sanders, whose new book Still invites us to learn to see well, and to make mindful and soulful connection with the world.
'I wrote this for the seekers,' he says, 'the tired souls, and the creatives who feel like they’ve lost their spark. I want to show you that a camera isn’t just a tool for capturing light, it’s a gateway to presence.'
To find that gateway - with a camera or not - here's some advice. One thing Paul does is try to 'arrive well' in the landscape he's photographing. He takes a few moments or minutes to breathe more slowly and to become aware, counting five seconds on the inhale and five on the exhale (and often closing his eyes, which is fascinatingly counter-intuitive for a photographer!).
This paves the way, he says, not just to be calm, but to find a state of flow. 'Instead of trying to impose our will on the world, we seek a state of empty, open receptiveness,' he says, calling flow 'an optimal state of consciousness in which you feel more connected and less inhibited.' And which I think we could call a form of prayer, a prayer-flow with the Creator and creation.
Take some breaths now, to arrive at 'this' place well, and to flow with God, with love, from here. Why not use yesterday's 'Give us ... bread' prayer:
Breathe in: “hahb …
Breathe out: “lahn”.
Breathe in: “lach …
Breathe out: “mah”.
* * *
Visio Divina
You may simply like to meet the image below of the swallows (of Psalm 84!) very much on your own terms. Both Paul and I chose it from his book. Spend time with it, giving it your pure attention. And then move on to my own very short creative response below.
But if you'd like to try 'Visio Divina', a way of immersing yourself prayerfully in a 'sacred image' to help you experience God in a way beyond words, here are five simple steps to help. As St Augustine said: 'In every image that stirs our soul, God is whispering to us, calling us deeper into His love and presence.'
1. Relax, breathe and invite God to be in this moment with you.
2. Gaze at the whole picture. Notice textures, shapes, foreground, background, depth of field - and what you begin to be drawn to.
3. Reflect on that particular part of the image. Give it your loving attention. What emotions does this evoke? How might God be speaking to you?
4. Respond, with a few words of prayer, or by speaking out what it is that you sense, or appreciate, as you connect with the image.
5. Rest in union and communion with God the Creator, within the space the image opens up for you. Take some more breaths. Be still.
(FOr the photograph itself, click here to view it.)
* * *
This is my own personal response (after Psalm 84, Psalm 23 and Matthew 6.26, 'look at the birds'):
A Place at Your Altar
A place at your altar
along with the rest;
the travelled and weary,
the wired and blessed.
A place for the pilgrim,
the migrant to land;
the grace of belonging,
the work of your hand.
A place at your table
to welcome us back;
Your house is my home
and there's nothing I lack.
* * *
May we be still and flow, today.
Go well!
Brian
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Wellspring Wednesdays - RSVP!
Wednesday is the creative wellspring of our week, so this is your invitation to share, now! You know the score - a few lines of poetry or prose, a photo or painting or example of craftwork or anything else you like. (Anyone see the full moon or watch the lunar eclipse in the US or elsewhere?!)
You will help me hugely if your offerings are concise and simple in format. Please just send one RSVP, by replying to this email. There's no pressure to participate at all, but do have a look at what others create!
They'll appear bit by bit on the RSVP page here. And if yours doesn't go up straight away, don't fear. I'll get round to it, but it takes me some time.
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Gracing the Days
* Why not listen to this sublime choral setting of (some of) Psalm 84, 'And the Swallow', by Caroline Shaw.
* Paul suggests, as an exercise in attention, documenting your day with a series of lovingly taken photos - a sequence of five, say - that help to tell the story of your day. Use this as a way of staying in prayerful creative flow, today.
* Another exercise is to make art like it's child's play: 'I often like to ask my subject questions such as, "What are you trying to share with me?" This is where a childlike attitude can be helpful - to look at something I might have seen a hundred times before as though it's the first time I've ever noticed it.'
You could try taking photos (or simply seeing the world) from child's-eye level by kneeling or sitting down. Notice what you notice from a different perspective. Ask the question, 'What are you trying to share with me?' - ask it of whatever you're beholding, and you might like to ask it of God, as well, in the process.
* Why not meditate on Psalm 84 today. And meditate on the birds.
* You can watch my conversation for Advent 2023 with Paul Sanders here. If you haven't seen it, it's lovely - Paul's so gently inspiring and informative!
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10 // Food for the Hungry Soul
'Give us today our daily bread' Matthew 6.11
* * *
Good morning!
In the delicious silence I fed from yesterday, as my restless mind came to rest in God, I swear I could almost hear the spring buds opening, and new life flowing through creation, including me. How good it is to find a flow with God!
And it makes me think of the Lord's Prayer again.
When Jesus said, "Give us this day", he wasn't teaching us to beg like Oliver Twist for meagre resources but to open ourselves to God’s life-flow - and to let it flow through us, too.
The Aramaic scholar Neil Douglas-Klotz believes the word Jesus would have used in his own tongue for ‘give us’ is habwlan (pronounced “hahb-lahn”) - which he suggests carries an added sense 'that everything is created and formed in the larger reality of the constantly creating God.' As we pray it, we are, he says, 'simply, willingly aligning ourselves with this ongoing flowing reality.’ So why not open your hands and heart, and breathe 'Give us' -
Breathe in: “hahb-”
Breathe out: “lahn”. (And repeat.)
* * *
I love how Biblical language is often layered with meaning. If we shift to the Greek for a moment (which the Gospel writers used), multiple layers flow through one unique scriptural word for 'daily' (as in 'daily bread').
Epiousion is not used anywhere else at all in Greek literature, only here in the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6 & Luke 11), making it very possible that one of the Gospel writers coined it. And as it’s so extraordinarily rare, there’s debate about its definitive meaning, which could be:
Bread for today, and just enough (echoing manna in the desert). Or:
Bread for our 'being' (as in food for the soul, or the bread of life). Or:
Bread of tomorrow, 'from the coming age’ - which brings eternal life, and carries echoes of the Lord's Supper.
And perhaps the ambiguity is the very point, with all three meanings working in layered harmony. There's so much to feed on in this one word, from manna, to provision for our 'whole' self, to Jesus himself, broken and shared for us.
* * *
But coming back to the language Jesus spoke in, the Aramaic word for bread is lachma (“lach-mah”). And Douglas-Klotz explains how there's no separation in this word between the food we eat, and ‘the sustenance we receive as wisdom, inspiration, emotional support, or enlightening ideas, which can all reroute us onto the track of our soul’s path.’
I wonder what has flowed to you, and through you, already this week, which brings you to life, stirs your soul, gives you hope, feeds you with God?
Breathe in: “lach-
Breathe out: “mah”. (And repeat.)
* * *
I admit, I'm relieved I wasn't in the wilderness with Moses and the Israelites, having to trust in God for the daily manna. Your very life depended on it.
But their practice of waking, going into the desert, gathering enough for today, and trusting for tomorrow, seems to be a recurring rhythm, alluded to in the Lord’s Prayer, and one we can practice in Lent. Perhaps we should trust and pray as if our lives depended on it, too. Because really, they do.
It's beautiful to think that the provision of God's enough-ness each day is in fact so life-bringing that it satisfies the soul and overflows into eternity! And to think: as we align with 'the constantly creating God', we can pass on enough of what's asked of us to feed the next mouth, too.
* * *
May we find bread for the journey, today.
Go well!
Brian
with thanks to Ann B
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Gracing the Days
Pause to pray the Aramaic words today for “Give us” and “Bread” -
Breathe in: “hahb …
Breathe out: “lahn”.
Breathe in: “lach …
Breathe out: “mah”.
Set your alarm to repeat that later in the day, spending a few minutes in the breath prayer, as a way of aligning with God and receiving daily bread.
* Have a listen to this song 'Daily Bread' by Pat Barrett and Kari Jobe, recommended by my daughter Mercy!
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It's a Full Moon Tonight! (And total lunar eclipse in US, Australia, ...)
Yes yes yes! A full moon, and a total lunar eclipse if you're in the right part of the world. If that's not food for the soul, then nothing is! Do step outside and watch it rise, as it graces the eastern skies!
It's that sublime point of equilibrium when the sun sets and the moon rises at around the same time - 6pm-ish here in the UK. If you climb a hill you can hopefully watch both, and breathe your 'hahblahn' and 'lachmah' and find alignment with the Creator in a moment of transcendent beauty.
Let's remember, too, that for Jesus this would have been the last full moon before the Paschal moon and his arrest at Passover. I can't really imagine what it must have felt like for him to reflect on this lunar countdown, but let's stay mindful of the fact that he stayed the course for us, under such moonlit skies.
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* Thanks to Sue T for reminding me of this very helpful poem by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer about absorbing global news: 'Before I Read the News'.
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Plus:
* This is the Lord's Prayer as a body prayer.
* You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* If you missed 'Live at Five', you can watch it here.
* Your wonderful creative RSVPs are here.
* And you can watch my interview with Pastor Elizabeth Macaulay here.
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Credits
Neil Douglas-Klotz, The Aramaic Jesus: 40 Days of Contemplation and Revelation (HarperOne, 2025)
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9 // Game Over?
'Seek first the kingdom of God ...' Matthew 6.33
* * *
Good morning!
I’m so grateful for the voices of balm, calm, challenge and inspiration that come in times like this. Nadia Bolz-Weber's is one of them, and she was asked recently online how we can carry the weight of the world when it's all so heavy.
She said we can't, and referenced the video game Tetris - in which coloured blocks fall from the top of the screen. You must hastily fit them together in a solid wall, leaving no gaps as they reach the bottom. The blocks keep falling faster, and it's 'game over' if you leave a space or the pieces pile too high. Coping with the news seems very much like that kind of game, right now.
* * *
But I’m mindful too, that the same could be said for the cascade of wonderful resources that we try to fit in as antidote: the podcasts and blogs and postings. It's a golden age for online spiritual wisdom, and I for one am so grateful. Yet there are so many voices that it's hard to know who to listen to next. Spiritual 'fomo' (fear of missing out) can drive us to keep on consuming - along with the hope that the next great 'find' will be the one that slots everything into place.
I’m conscious, by the way, of the irony of writing this in a Lent series you’ve so kindly signed up for.
* * *
Now, it's crucial to affirm our God-given curiosity and our thirst for wisdom. But when the voices in our headphones start to feel too much, let's be kind to ourselves and remember: Lent invites the shift from restless consumption to restful communion. It's the perfect time to redirect our attention from information overload to encounter. Take the headphones out, and head for the desert.
Of course, it's rarely easy to settle in to desert space, and even sitting quietly for a few minutes can be a test (so don't despair!) - it takes time for our restless mind to come to rest in God; and to let our whole self sit as One with him.
And if we're honest, perhaps we reach for a podcast not just for helpful insight, but because God usually seems to speak in a language of silence and stillness which can't so readily be 'consumed'. To our twitchy ego, that’s crazy, and it would much rather latch on to someone with something to say.
But to the soul, it’s blessed relief.
'Hush,
be still.'
* * *
There's a difference between restlessly consuming, and waiting for our daily bread, which is the kind of soul-food that seems to come without striving; indeed, when we cease striving. We'll think more about it tomorrow. But let's start this week simply by orienting ourselves to the still, silent voice of God.
It's not an absence but a presence - which we come, in time, to sense as we leave the anxious inner pharaoh for the grace of the Creator; as we bring our hunger, and give ourselves the space we really need, like Jesus, to wait for the Lord; as we explore that holy place of new beginnings, beyond 'game over'.
* * *
May we turn and tune to God, today.
Go well!
Brian
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Micro-Sabbath Mondays
* Why not use the Lent Compass Prayer to lead you into a place of assured quiet - and from there take a few extra moments or minutes in quiet communion with God, just being together. You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* Try to search out silence and stillness today. Wait with God there.
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* Winchester cathedral has recorded this moving version of Sarina Partridge's 'The Red Sun Rises', alongside the 'Helios' art installation. It's a message of solidarity to the people of Minneapolis, and anyone else singing their way back to hope. Let it remind you of the creative resistance we reflected on last week.
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8 // Sabbath as Resistance
‘You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing’ (Ps 145.15-16).
* * *
Good morning!
God is not anxious.
I know it sounds obvious, yet it really hit me, yesterday -
God is not anxious.
You might like to sit open-handed in his Presence which graces you, now.
* * *
We can't take it for granted, can we? And I mention it, because - in contrast - the god-king Pharaoh, who enslaved the Israelites and represents more than just a historical figure, was anxious.
In fact, Walter Brueggemann (in his gem of a book Sabbath as Resistance), writes that Pharaoh was ‘an endlessly anxious presence who caused the entire social environment to be permeated with a restless anxiety that had no limit or termination.’ You know the type.
So the Israelites had to make bricks, bricks and more bricks, faster and harder, with no break and no end in sight.
Perhaps you feel you’re doing likewise, at the moment; our own culture of anxiously driven productivity builds like a pyramid from a base of cheap (and often exploited) labour up to the powerful and wealthy at the tip of the top.
* * *
How good for us all, then, that God jams a rod into the spokes of Pharaoh's chariot and says, “Enough is enough.” And thus the story shifts from oppressive restlessness to restfulness, as God releases his people from their heavy yoke.
After they pass through the waters and into the desert, God issues the ten commandments for a wholly different way of life, which establish (1-3) God’s rule, not Pharaoh's, (4) the sabbath, and (5-10) a beloved community. Sabbath rests there itself as a threshold between God and the people.
God, of course, took a rest on the seventh day, and insists that we get one, too, whoever we are - even the donkeys that will work the ‘promised’ land, and the land itself, and the ‘aliens’ who will one day find a home among God’s people.
It’s all good news: ‘In the ancient context,’ says Brueggemann, ‘they must depart from the Egyptian system in order to dance and sing freedom.’
* * *
Of course, it’s not easy to slow down when our motors are set to run at brick-making speed. It takes time to resist the drive to prove, to succeed, to store up. That’s what Lent helps us with, in our own desert way. Jesus said his yoke is easy and his burden light, so "Come all you who are weary!"
In sabbath resistance, we don't try to achieve, but to receive the kind of gifts which lie outside the domain of empire. Song. Dance. Wonder. Gratitude. Mercy. Freedom. Grace.
The sight of a brimstone butterfly, this week. The scent of almond blossom - that harbinger of better days, and a biblical symbol of God’s watchfulness over us (Jeremiah 1.11). Thank God his kingdom is more like a tree than a pyramid!
* * *
Some Christian expressions of ‘sabbath' have, let's say, erred on the side of the puritanical. But if it’s really about freedom and song, why not be creative this weekend. If you’re not a busy person, perhaps sabbath is about making connection. A walk in the company of creation. A shared meal. Or to be the gift that money just can't buy for someone who can't afford to stop!
If you can’t observe a whole day, observe the wholeness of a moment. If you can’t stop everything, start with one small thing. When we put down our brick we can open our hand to God’s. Take the kind of break that God would love to take with us. It's been quite a week, after all.
Meanwhile, the world will keep turning. God, let's remember, is not anxious.
* * *
May you open your hand to his, today.
Go well!
Brian
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TODAY! Live at Five - 5pm GMT, YouTube
* It's the second of our 'Live at Five' sessions tonight, on YouTube, at 5pm (GMT)! A chance to meet in real time, light a candle, practice some stillness, review the week's reflections, and share in the chat. Please join me by clicking here just before 5pm. (Or you can watch later!)
Gracing the Days
* Find an almond tree, this weekend, or any tree in blossom, and revel in the promise. Why not sketch it or write a haiku, while you are there, to help you to be present. Or savour Van Gogh's hopeful painting 'Almond Blossom', below.
* In the Anglican liturgy today, the poet-priest George Herbert is celebrated. Have a listen to Gail Randall's choral setting of George Herbert's 'The Call'.
Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life:
Such a Way, as gives us breath:
Such a Truth, as ends all strife:
Such a Life, as killeth death.
Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength:
Such a Light, as shows a feast:
Such a Feast, as mends in length:
Such a Strength, as makes his guest.
Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart:
Such a Joy, as none can move:
Such a Love, as none can part:
Such a Heart, as joyes in love.
* I appreciated reaing this CS Lewis quotation today (via James Clear) from The Weight of Glory. It speaks to what we're reflecting on: 'The sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a person alone reading a book that interests them; and all economics, politics, laws, armies, and institutions, are only valuable in so far as they prolong and multiply such scenes.'
* Do take time this weekend to enjoy the wonderful creative RSVPs from our community on the RSVP page here. Thank you so much for your inspiration!
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7 // Sole to Soul
“He is the one who comes after me, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.” John 1.27
* * *
Good morning!
Imagine, if you would, Jesus trying on his first pair of shoes. And his mother’s care as she helps him on with them; teaching him, in time, to tie the straps for himself. I wonder what it was like for him to start to stand on his own two feet.
I think it's hard to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, but since my chat with Elizabeth Macaulay, I’ve been trying to. And I've been reminded of a charity, the Empathy Museum, which has a diverse collection of shoes, each with a story. You can put on a pair and walk while listening to a short audio recording of their original owner. So you hear and feel what it’s like to walk in their shoes.
It’s a brilliant exercise in empathy, and you might have seen it at Greenbelt this year. But you can also listen to a wide range of examples online; I’ve just heard the story of a children's palliative care worker. Quite some shoes to fill.
You may just like to imagine for yourself walking in the shoes of a mum, say, who's arrived here on a small boat, feet sodden from jumping ashore into the shallow sea. Or the boots of a police officer having to arrest a climate protester. Or someone you know - a friend going through chemo or moving house or just quietly getting on with life. Empathy, practiced well, is surely prayer.
* * *
It also makes me wonder what it would be like for someone to walk in ourshoes. Have a look at yours, now. What is it like to go where you go, in the way that God created you to, and to feel what you feel, and to have the kind of day you’re having? What story would you tell, of what it’s like to walk as you?
You may like to use your shoes, today, as a walking meditation, from the time you put them on. As our compass prayer says, ‘Guide me / in Your paths.’
* * *
How humbling that God himself chose to walk in humanity's shoes, sole to soul, so to speak - to come to know what it’s really like to walk the extra mile with us, and always, surely, with such distinctive grace.
I wonder what happened to his final pair of sandals. Leather and dust. Where were they left when they were stripped from him, as he stepped into our place so sacrificially? What a story they would carry.
* * *
Who was this man who walked this way? We can't step into his shoes as fully as he steps into ours; though by trying, we might helpfully loosen some of our assumptions of him, like sandal straps.
In the end, ours are the shoes we're called to fill. And as we learn the way of grounded grace from him, this Lent, we stand and walk (and sing!) together.
* * *
May we go sole to soul, today.
Go well!
Brian
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RSVPs
* Thank you SO much for your vibrant creativity and wellsprings of Wednesday wisdom! I'm still uploading responses from yesterday, so make sure you keep checking back to savour our communal expression coming to life on the RSVP page here. (Please don't send any more until next 'Wellspring Wednesday'!)
Gracing the Days
* Walk prayerfully wherever you go, today - bringing close attention to your feet, the ground beneath them, and your breathing. Carry grace with you, as you go, in whatever form that takes for you.
* Think of one person you know, today, and imagine prayerfully what it’s like to walk in their shoes. Use this as a way of standing with them, today.
* You can visit the online Empathy Museum here. This is Peter's story - he's a cancer nurse who finds joy in his work, even in difficult circumstances.
* Why not record your own story into your phone, as if you're doing it for someone else who’ll wear your shoes for a while! Let this act be a sacred way of honouring your story, and perhaps hearing something of it yourself for the first time, even as you tell it. Listen back to it later, with fresh ears.
* Here's something to listen to: '‘Dieus Sal la Terra’ is a modern reimagining of a Corsican paghjella, a UNESCO-protected endangered vocal tradition. It's a really evocative musical act of remembrance and solidarity for oral culture, history, and today's struggles for peace. Its (translated) lyrics are:
‘God save the land and the place,
where you are and where you remain.
Whatever place I’m in,
my heart is there,
for no man here has power over that.’
(With thanks to Emily Flinders.)
----------
6 // Here Comes the Sun
‘The LORD make His face shine upon you,
and be gracious to you.' (Numbers 6.25)
* * *
Good morning!
Before we do anything, let's pause to breathe:
(In) "Grace ..."
(Out) "Upon grace." (And repeat.)
Allow your body to soften, and to receive, like breath, the grace upon grace of God. Feel God breathing with you, through you.
Notice the way the light falls around you. And imagine this light to be within you, radiating and illuminating your soul from the inside out. God-light.
Give thanks for one simple blessing, and sit with it for a while longer - and with greater attention - than you’d otherwise have given it.
* * *
I’m still giving thanks for this song by Sarina Partridge via Singing Resistance yesterday:
'Oh the red sun rises
On a world on fire
But it also rises
On a holy choir
Singing through the dark times
Through the ash and smoke
Weave the grief into the song
And sing our way back to hope.'
* * *
Here in Winchester, in the cathedral, we've had our own ‘red sun rising’ - in the form of a giant glowing sculpture of the sun. It’s both humbling and inspiring. 'Helios’ is by the artist Luke Jerram, and I’m now day-dreaming of 'lit' people singing "Oh the red sun rises" beneath it, before it goes. Who knows?
This huge-scale, awe-inspiring star, which fills much of the nave with its physical presence (and the rest with its radiance), invites you to come up close and stare into the soul of something you’d never normally dare to.
After all, we can gaze at the moon all we like, but the sun we can barely glance at. We must usually close our eyes as we turn our face toward it to receive its blessing, just as we might close our eyes as we turn our face toward God.
It’s helped me to remember how the sun’s wild language of life-light speaks of the love of God which carries to all, today. And of how, if we let it shine within us, such life-lit love could naturally flood out from us to all around us, not just the 'chosen'.
* * *
The sun rises, likewise, on both ashes and hope, as the resistance song puts it. But it’s so true that usually we need to 'weave the grief into the song’ to sing our way through from the ash to the hope.
Richard Rohr echoes this in his book The Tears of Things. He traces a spiritual trajectory in which we move, as the Biblical prophets did, from rage and anger, through grief and tears, to compassion and love.
And this, he says, is the movement of grace. Upon us, within us, through us.
Like tears, grace comes unannounced, and while we can’t control it, we can allow it. So be prepared to yield; to sit with your feelings, and honour the flow.
Today promises to be one of the first truly spring-like, sunny days of the year (here in the UK) - and while we might associate sunshine purely with joy, how gracious of God that we may turn a tear-soaked face toward the life-light, too, and close our eyes, and feel the radiant kiss of hope.
* * *
May the Lord bless you and keep you, today.
Go well!
Brian
----------------
Wellspring Wednesdays! Time for your RSVPs!
So, Wednesday is the creative wellspring of our week, when I'll invite you, in the spirit of Singing Resistance or Luke Jerram or U2 (below!) to respond to your journey so far with a few lines of poetry, or a drawing or painting or with sewing or crafting, or with a photo or a short paragraph of prose.
You will help me hugely if your offerings are concise and simple in format. Please just send one RSVP, by replying to this email. There's no pressure to participate at all, but do have a look at what others create!
They'll appear bit by bit on the RSVP page here. Thank you!
Gracing the Days
* In an evocative act of creative resistance, the band U2 have released an EP (on Ash Wednesday, called 'Days of Ash') of songs which speak to prevailing global injustices, most notably the evocative ‘The Tears of Things’.
Bono wrote on social media: ‘The song borrows its title from Richard Rohr's book, which examines, through the writings of the Jewish prophets, how one can live compassionately in a time of violence and despair.
'It imagines a conversation between Michelangelo’s David and his creator… where the young man with the sling and five smooth stones refuses the idea that he has to become Goliath to defeat him ... He’s also revealed as having heart shaped pupils half a millennia before the heart shaped emoji, which puzzles visitors at the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, Italy, to this day.’
* This is a good day to pray the Compass Prayer. As you face east, to the rising sun, pause to let God's life-light shine upon you, and within you, whether you can see the sun or not. You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* You might wish to listen again to 'The Red Sun Rises' by Sarina Partirdge. Her website is here.
* Helios is in Winchester until March 1. More information here.
...
You can watch my interview with Pastor Elizabeth Macaulay here.
You can watch Friday's 'Live at Five' here.
This is the Lord's Prayer as a body prayer.
* Watch for the moon tonight, too. Give thanks for the interwoven nature of moonlight and sunlight, and sense your place of belonging within Creation.
----
Credits
Richard Rohr, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage (SPCK, 2025)
------------------
5 // Come Sing Your Part
He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God. Psalm 40.3
* * *
Good morning!
When news broke that the intensive-care nurse Alex Pretti had been fatally shot in an incident involving federal ICE agents on the streets of Minneapolis, across the city Pastor Elizabeth Macaulay was already en route to her church (the Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church) to host an event for the civil-rights movement known as 'Singing Resistance'.
'Singing Resistance' began in Minneapolis days after Renée Good was fatally shot in January. People came onto the streets to sing to those who were too afraid to leave their houses - songs of reassurance that they were not alone. In eight short weeks, it's become a national movement of shared song, gracing the days. Expressing lament, solidarity, and also songs to the ICE agents:
"We walk the same ground, but we've been torn apart.
Put down your weapons, come sing your part."
* * *
At Elizabeth's church, 1,400 people gathered that night. Candles were lit and passed between everyone, as the community grieved and responded not in kind but in ritual and song.
'We thought it would be really powerful to be able to pass light from one to another as a visual witness of the power of our shared conviction that we are called to better than this,' she told me in a conversation we recently recorded.
And I hope their light is passed like a candle to us here, in three ways. First, that we simply bear witness to the courage and creativity of sisters and brothers in the US. Second, that we learn from what a pastor is learning at the sharp end. And third, that we are inspired to respond creatively ourselves in life.
To sing our part.
* * *
It's a powerful 30-minute interview. Please do watch it, if you can, and pass it on. At the foot of this email are a few links to songs and an introductory news piece from CNN, for extra context.
You can watch our conversation here on my YouTube channel.
Or you can listen to the audio here.
And if you don't have time to watch or listen quite yet, I've distilled three short excerpts for you, below, to read now.
* * *
1. Although what's been happening in Minneapolis has been shocking, it's part of what people with black or brown skin have to live with all the time.
'We thought we lived in a particular world, but in fact we live in this other world that people of colour have been telling us about. It's always there, and now we are forced to turn and see. And it's been heart-breaking. We will never be the same in this city, but that's perhaps a good thing.
'There are people afraid to leave their homes, they can't go out to get groceries, they can't go out to work or for medical appointments. They're hiding, literally, behind closed doors. So for those of us who do have the privilege to gather, we're singing a balm or a witness - for the day when all of us, of all colours and immigration statuses, can greet each other fully again.
Why not try to put yourself in someone else's shoes today. Imagine prayerfully what it's really like for someone with less privilege.
2. The power of ritual, and holding sacred space, and singing!
'Our church is in downtown Minneapolis, and we see ourselves as a community gathering place. A resilience hub, of sorts. We have to hold the space open so that people can feel the feels, as they do. And to keep preaching (in my case) a message of both resistance and hope. And the power of shared community.
'People needed that place to come to gather, and to join their voices in creating a witness and ... beauty. Leaning into the power of those shared voices was an antidote to despair. Our hearts literally become attuned to each other in singing.
'Ritual is so immense, and even people who have walked away from the church or never been in one still have a need to name that which is beyond words. The church is called to hold grieving hearts but also hearts that are longing to be connected with others. It was remarkable - I can still feel the echoes in the sanctuary. We are now teaching those protest songs as part of our worship. They're sacred!'
What kind of space could you create and hold open, this Lent, in which others can find connection? It might be a physical sanctuary; it could simply be the personal space of your own presence, opened as a 'resilience hub' of sorts!
3. Resistance is often framed as political and social, but how as a pastor are you setting this in spiritual terms?
'We're called to be salt and light as a community. Salt, of course, melts 'ice'! (Who can resist that?) But it's all there in the teachings of our faith. We cannot look away from this, or the other affronts that are happening to Creation, and you name it. The desecration is widespread. For the church to be relevant to what is happening, we have to name what's going on.
'It's saying no to what is unjust, while shining a light on what is possible. Who are we called to be? We don't have to preach so much about what we're against, but what are we for?
'We are for a world in which all people encounter blessing, and know that they are blessing, and worthy of the abundance this world has to offer. God has created 'enough-ness' in this world, and we're all called to celebrate that and live in such a way that the sacred gift of each other is celebrated.'
What are you 'for'? Write a few words, or respond creatively if you have time.
* * *
Elizabeth is delightfully grounded. Her spiritual practice for staying true in these difficult days is to play with her grandchildren, she says. And her touchstone poem is 'Instructions for Living a Life' by Mary Oliver:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
'And that is what I seek to practice,' she concludes. And that, for today, is surely enough.
* * *
May we sing our part.
Go well!
Brian
----------------
Gracing the Days
* Have a listen to this song. It's one of many you can find on the singing resistance Instagram account. Sing it with the gathered people there. You might like to return to this later, and light a candle for the people of Minneapolis, too.
The red sun rises
On a world on fire
But it also rises
On a holy choir
Singing through the dark times
Through the ash and smoke
Weave the grief into the song
And sing our way back to hope
* Watch a really helpful introductory video from CNN about singing resistance and the event at Elizabeth's church here.
* This is one of the songs sung that night at the church: 'Grief, moving through me ...' It's a powerful, moving and meditative chant by Sarina Partridge.
* This is the 'Singing Resistance Songbook' - a compendium of all the songs that are being shared freely within the movement, and being added to.
* And this is a clip of a gathering learning the song addressed to ICE agents, and then singing it outside their hotel. (Click the volume button on the screen if its muted!) "Put down your weapons, come sing your part."
...
* In case you've missed these:
You can watch Friday's 'Live at Five' here.
This is the Lord's Prayer as a body prayer.
You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* Watch for the moon as it waxes toward being full next week. Think of those in troubled parts of the world today, looking up at the same moon. We remember those in Ukraine, on the fourth anniversary of the start of the war.
-------------------
4 // Resistance is Fertile
‘Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and God will come near to you.’ James 4.7
* * *
Good morning!
One day last week, I resisted the strong temptation to rush into writing, though my day was behind schedule. Instead, I set my timer for 10 minutes and turned my chair to face the garden - where soon, a fidgety rustle in the nearby hedge unveiled a goldcrest! As the tiny little bird with its golden cap shimmered from tree to tree, I felt graced and grounded. Holy-grounded.
Resistance isn’t futile, it’s fertile.
And I'm sure small acts like this can help us to practice and prepare for greater ones, even as they scatter grains of salt and flicker shards of light from the soul. I wonder which temptation we might practice resisting, today? The urge to ‘scroll’, perhaps, or rush, or to gossip or judge, or to be self-critical, all of which have a ripple effect. Watch what happens when we join the resistance!
* * *
It's not that we want to define ourselves by who or what we resist - whether that’s phones or indeed the troubling currents shaping our world right now. Yet resistance is required, usually, to break the circuit of a toxic habit or addiction, or indeed to disrupt an oppressive or unjust system.
‘Resist the devil, and he will flee from you,’ writes James (4.7).
* * *
For Jesus in the desert, much of his own resistance came through fasting - which for us, this Lent, might mean intermittent fasting from meals as spiritual practice; or a habit-breaking pause from anything that requires the focus of self-discipline and self-denial.
Yet mercifully that’s not the whole story. Simultaneously, resistance invites us to breathe the defining alternative into life. To grace the world with an irresistibly different way, you might say. ‘Come near to God,’ James continues, ‘and God will come near to you.’
As Henri Nouwen tells us, in the desert, Jesus resists three lies of ego - ‘I am what I do or achieve’ (“Turn these stones to bread!”); ‘I am what others say about me' (“Throw yourself from the Temple and the angels will catch you!”); ‘I am what I have’ ("All of this could be yours!”).
At the same time, Jesus opens up sacred space for ‘life in its fullness’ to begin to grow like flowers in the desert. Rare, fertile ground, indeed.
* * *
I'm sure the best kind of resistance is creative and life-bringing; and always, always grass-rooted in love. We'll follow the thread further this week, but for now, writing of the gathering unease in her native US, Anne Lamott has said:
‘I can tell you this: the resistance will be peaceful, nonviolent, colorful, multi-generational - we older people will march with you, no matter our sore feet and creaky joints. Until then, this will be my fight song: left foot, right foot, breathe. Help the poor however you can, plant bulbs in the cold rocky soil, and rest.’
I'm sure you'll have your own inspiring alternatives, too, which will add unique colour and grace to the movement of love. To the irresistible resistance, then? Left foot, right foot ...Vive!
* * *
May your soul scatter salt and flicker light, today.
Go well!
Brian
----------------
Micro-Sabbath Mondays!
It strikes me that Mondays - typically a busy start to the week - are a perfect opportunity to practice bringing some of the weekend's sabbath goodness to bear upon the quality of the week. To let it infuse and shift the nature of the day.
I heard a lady on the radio who’s practicing ‘phone-free Mondays’. She explained how strange it felt to leave the house without it - but then, how enriching. You might like to consider, with me, fasting from your phone, for a short while, each Monday. Or from a meal. Or adding a short deliberate pause - to resist the culture of urgency and to arrive with presence and blessing to wherever you happen to be going, today. Here's to micro-sabbath Mondays!
Gracing the Days
* If you'd like to take a short pause now to soak in a sublime piece of choral music, close your eyes and listen to Erik Ešenvalds' version of 'O Salutaris Hostia', performed by the choir of Trinity College Cambridge. It's part of a eucharistic hymn written by Thomas Aquinas (you can find the words here).
* I wrote a poem-prayer (which I shared on Live at Five) to distill something of this year's theme. Why not pray it as a way of setting your intention, today:
Gracing the Days
Here I am, Lord
in your grace
Stepping into
sacred space.
Here I am, to
find the Source;
help me stay
this desert course.
Here I am, Lord,
breaking up,
mend my heart
and fill my cup.
Here I am, how
long, how long?
Help me sing
Creation's song.
Here we are, Lord:
fix our gaze!
May - in your grace -
we grace these days.
(bd 2026)
I'll be inviting your own short creative responses to the series so far on Wednesday. So you might like to begin crafting a poem or painting a picture or whatever you like to do when you respond creatively to God and life!
* In case you've missed these:
You can watch Friday's 'Live at Five' here.
This is the Lord's Prayer as a body prayer.
You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* Remember to watch for the moon - a white comma in the sky at present, which, like a comma in a sentence, opens a little space for a pause for breath, for meaning, as you remember Jesus looking up to this moon too.
-------------------
3 // On Earth As In Heaven
'This, then, is how you should pray ...' Matthew 6.9
* * *
Good morning!
Our mention of the Lord's Prayer, yesterday, and of praying with the heart of Jesus, stirred me. Who knows when the prayer became fully formed in him, but surely its genesis lay in part in the solitude of those desert days with God.
I love to imagine Jesus there in the desert, with nothing to do but … everything, really, that really matters. 40 days of paring back, re-tracing the Source.
And wouldn’t he have noted lovingly all that began to bubble up? Not in a journal, so much as in rhythms of prayerful practice; some words, yes, but silence and encounter, too, which formed and flowed together into a stream from the Source - one that would course through his life and reach to us here.
* * *
Recently, I was sent an exquisitely simple musical rendering of the Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic, the language of Jesus. It comes (via Plough magazine) with words helpfully transcribed. In a sense, we don’t have to over-analyse here (though a few extra thoughts will follow). To listen is enough; to enter the stream of words Jesus used, and the stillness and the actions and the heartthat lay behind them.
You might like to listen, now. (Scroll down to the YouTube panel and press play. The words are above the panel.) Let its soul and mystery carry you deeper in.
* * *
Perhaps there’s a line or phrase of the Lord's Prayer that especially resonates with you, today. For me, at this time of global upheaval, it’s this:
Nehwe sebyonokh
Aykano dbašmayo oph bar`o
Hab lan laħmo dsunqonan
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Something deep within Jesus already knew the Father’s will, though he was here in the desert to let it be unveiled in him fully. God's will would become 'food' (John 4.34) for this man who learned all about hunger.
He’d grown up under empire, his people living beneath the weight of imperial power and its quiet violences. And empire was never only ‘Rome’. It was — as it still is — ego writ large, land grabs, hardening power.
Jesus was here to show how another world is possible, one that comes more naturally to all God's children, deep down: kin-ship, selfless love, shalom. The kingdom of God is like a seed that was planted in us from the very beginning.
* * *
We can get so preoccupied with finding the way to heaven that we forget the way of heaven itself, which comes to earth to meet us here. Grounded. Bare-foot. Utterly gracious. This kingdom is at hand, he said.
Heaven’s way does not force itself or corrupt; it doesn't leave for dead those trapped helplessly in the system - the used and abused, the forgotten, the overlooked, the ‘disappeared’.
It comes not to fight fire with fire but to confront dis-grace with the most truly unsettling, arresting and disarming power of grace itself. Heaven’s way dares us not to look the other way, but to step into the cross fire with fiercer love.
Just one line of a simple prayer, then, brought to life in Jesus, to bring us back to life, today. I'm so, so grateful. Let us pray.
* * *
May God's will be done, in us as in heaven.
Go well!
Brian
I'll be back with the next written reflection on Monday, but do join me for today's LIVE at FIVE on YouTube - details below!
----------------
Gracing the Days
* If you'd like to pray the Lord's Prayer as a body prayer, I have recorded this short video which borrows from Philip Roderick's version - one that I have loved using myself. It helps you to inhabit the prayer in your body, especially through the direction of the hands. When the days get warmer there's nothing like praying this with bare feet, too, but for now, I hope this gives you another way into the prayer, today. (There's a bit of clatter going on, but that's life!)
* Keep going with the compass prayer for Lent, this weekend! See if you can create a ritual or practice in terms of where and when you pray with it. You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* Remember to watch for the moon - incrementally 'waxing' and at the moment, a gorgeous slender crescent!
...
Credits
Thank you so much to Philip G for alerting me to the Plough's piece on the Lord's Prayer.
------------------
2 // Shall We Say Grace?
'So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.' 1 Corinthians 10.31
* * *
Good morning!
I wonder how you'll do what you're about to do next? Whether it's going to the shops or taking a meeting or having a Zoom call or looking after kids or meeting a friend for coffee, or whatever it is that comes after this.
If we're on autopilot, the chances are we might lack a little grace, in terms of poise or indeed patience. But that's the beauty of our Lent journey. As we invite God’s grace to enter this moment, it prepares us for the next. Why not invite the grace of God to fill you, as you take a breath, relinquish and receive.
Breathe in: "Grace ..."
Breathe out: "upon grace." (and repeat)
* * *
I ask, because recently I learned of a wonderful Hebrew word, kavanah, via the Jewish Christian author Mirabai Starr.
Though not directly translatable, it's about setting our heart's intention, and in Judaism it applies especially to the kind of formal prayer you might otherwise pray by rote. Instead of simply going through the motions, we align our heart with God's, paying loving attention. Kavanah thus imbues the 'outer' ritual or practice with inner heart and soul. And as for prayer, so for life itself!
Imagine praying the Lord’s Prayer with the heart of Jesus. Why not pause, to pray it now.
* * *
Or take saying 'grace' before a meal. It might sometimes feel like a rote prayer, but just the very act of pausing can help open a space rich with potency.
A moment of intention, to align our hearts gratefully and grace-fully with God; to remember where the food has come from, or to think of those who are hungry today; to be mindful of savouring flavours and fragrances; to transform time at the table into something sacramental. Into communion.
'Grace', indeed.
* * *
And doesn’t heart-felt prayer overflow into embodied action? How good, to think we can flow from saying grace to being grace, as we orient ourselves with God.
Life is full of daily ‘rituals’ that we often perform by rote, and Mirabai Starr herself loves to apply kavanah to the ‘every day’: for as she says, it ‘renders the most ordinary activity holy’.
Pause, for instance, to breathe when you’re already running late, and a sacred space can open up around your stress. You can carry with you, as you go, the intention of arriving as a blessing, not a curse ... whenever you get there!
Or wait briefly before pressing ‘send’ on a text or email. What is my intention, here? How do these words bring into being the grace of not performing or striving or proving? How do they help to render this moment holy?
* * *
Kavanah surely works on different levels from the immediate to the longer reaching. What is my God-aligned intention in this very moment? Or for the next task at hand? Or for the season of Lent itself?
How good, then, to pause, before we really dig in to the feasting and fasting of Lent. As if we're saying grace before a meal, and turning our time together, for this season, into communion. As if we're becoming grace, for such a time as this - and always for God's glory.
* * *
May you set your intention, today.
Go well!
Brian
----------------
Gracing the Days
* Take a breath, and invite the grace of God to fill you, now. Visualise doing 'the next thing', and set your intention. Then go and do it, in the manner that would like to embody God's grace.
* Why not prayerfully set an intention for Lent itself. Write a paragraph in your journal about how you'd like to approach Lent, and perhaps a post-it with the distilled essence on your fridge or by your computer!
* I've created a compass prayer for Lent, using only Psalm 23. I just felt the nudge, this time! I hope you find it helpful: it's certainly a great opportunity to approach familiar words, in a daily practice, and imbue them with the heartbeat of grace as we pray them! You can find the Lent Compass Prayer here.
* With all this talk of grace, I've been reminded of Stormzy's wonderful 'Blinded by Your Grace'. Enjoy it, in a moment of quiet, today.
* Remember to step out in the evening to watch for the moon - tonight it will be the tiniest sliver of new moon! - as you stay mindful of standing with Jesus in the wilderness, and in preparation for the Passion. The next full moon is in fact March 3 (not 10, as I wrote yesterday) - and will involve a full eclipse in the US, Australia and Asia!
...
Credits
Mirabai Starr, Ordinary Mysticism: Your Life As Sacred Ground (HarperOne, 2025)
1 // Gracing the Days
‘For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.’ John 1.16 (ESV)
* * *
Good morning!
I'm thrilled to be starting this series with you. And so, today, let's set the scene.
When Jesus was baptised by John in the Jordan, the Spirit was surely alreadygracing the air that he breathed, the waters he was immersed in, and the light that danced on the breaking surface of the river (and sparkled in his eyes).
The Spirit was there, moving - just as the Spirit is here. Check your pulse, and feel God pulsing through you! “Grace upon grace upon grace upon grace ...”
Take a breath, and be filled with Presence.
You are immersed in God.
* * *
But then, the added gift, the sight of a dove descending, reflecting in his up-turned eyes. And the sound of a voice, “This is my child, whom I love.” God's personal presence, gracing Jesus, and reaching through him, to grace us all.
As we know, Jesus was drawn, straight after, into the desert for 40 days. In solitude, yes, but never alone: he went there in the Spirit, and with God’s love, to a place where his own true presence would also, in time, be unveiled.
* * *
Lent draws us here, too. The desert is a place where we may divest of the world's tired and tiring ways of rushing, proving, accumulating - to reveal Life without trappings, God without trimmings, and you, and me, as God created us.
Beneath mindless habits and hurry, then, something holy waits gently, patiently, to be unveiled: our life in God; and God, alive in us.
And to think: Jesus, who went there before us, now comes with us. To grace our every step with 'the added gift'; to invest in us his presence.
* * *
Our path into the holy ground of Lent is one of grace, all the Way. We’re not here to achieve but to relinquish and receive; we’re not asked to put a mask on and perform, but to humbly, gladly take it off.
And whether we're stepping boldly in, this year, or feel as if we’re barely holding on, no matter: we each belong, here with God, who offers ‘grace upon grace’, step by step, breath by breath, heartbeat by heartbeat.
Our invitation is to receive, openly. The gift we can give is to come, as we are, in grace, to him.
* * *
May the Lord bless you and keep you, as we begin.
Go well!
Brian
PS: It's not too late for friends or family to sign up here.
In appreciation of the life and work of the civil-rights leader Rev Jesse Jackson. In 1984 he famously said, 'We come from disgrace to amazing grace ...'
----------------
Gracing the Days
(links or ideas for 'practice', if you have a little more time)
* This is a simple, graceful piece of music called 'Never Alone' (Olafur Arnalds). It's only two minutes long. Bring your presence to God, humbly and openly as gift, and become aware of God's presence in you and around you.
* Consider something you'd like to divest of: a way of the world, or of ego, that just hasn't been helpful. (Divest means to let go, get rid of or relinquish, but it also means to unclothe. Imagine that it's like taking a mask off.)
* And consider one way you'd like to invest in this season. A little time each day in stillness, maybe. Or volunteering. Or a small daily act of art, craft or journalling.
...
* I'm planning to go to Winchester cathedral's Ash Wednesday evensong, which starts at 5.30pm GMT. If you can't get to a local service yourself to be 'ashed', why not tune in to the Winchester service and we can 'go' together.
* At the service, the choir will be singing Allegri's 'Misere', the sublime rendering of Psalm 51. This is a version from St Paul's Cathedral, recorded last year. You can read Psalm 51 here.
A Quick Note About the Moon
It's a new moon tonight, and thus a perfect opportunity to start watching for its progress through Lent - from nothing, as it waxes toward fullness (March 10), then wanes back to nothing, then waxes finally toward the full, Paschal moon on the night of Maundy Thursday / Good Friday. You might like to make it part of your Lent practice to step outside for a minute or two each night, to stand with Jesus in the desert, and to anticipate the night of his arrest at Easter.