18th. April 2020. Daily Devotion.

John 17:20-23

20 ‘My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one – 23 I in them and you in me – so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

Let us pray that out of this epidemic may come a deeper understanding of our fundamental human oneness and that all may be caught up in the healing love of God in Christ Jesus.

Once again, I am indebted to Peter Millar for thoughts for this week and our Saturday devotion.

At the heart of humanity:

In these tough times, familiar words take on a new meaning – a deeper meaning, a wider meaning. For me this is true of these words which are in the daily prayer of the Iona Community….. “We affirm the goodness of God at the heart of humanity planted more deeply than all that is wrong.”

Here in this place new light is streaming
Now is the darkness vanished away,
See in this space our fears and our dreaming
Brought here to you in the light of this day Marty Haugen

An ancient truth for today

“How can we determine the hour of the dawn, when the night ends and the day begins?” asked the Teacher. “When from a distance you can distinguish between a dog and a sheep suggested one of the students.” “No” was the answer. “Is it when one can distinguish between a fig tree and a grapevine?” asked a second student. “No.” “Please tell us the answer then.” “It is,” said the wise Teacher, “when you can look in the face of a human being and you have enough light to recognise in her/him your sister/brother. Up till then it is night, and darkness is still with us.” Hasidic Tale

The Affirming Flame

Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies:
Yet, dotted everywhere, ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the just exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them of Eros, and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame. W.H. Auden in 1939 at the start of the War.

Cherishing the ties that bind us

Humans need connection – we are social animals and exist in a network of reciprocal relationships. Solitary confinement is a form of torture that can swiftly drive people mad: locked into the cell of the self, the world does not reach them, and they cannot reach out into the world. Words need to be heard, pain recognised, joy shared. Loneliness is hazardous. These past extraordinary weeks have shown how much we yearn for connection and also how ingenious, funny, heartbreakingly generous and kind people can be in maintaining it in spite of imposed isolation.
More than all the new forms of creativity going on everywhere, I have heard over and over how people are talking to each other now – talking as they never have before, revealing themselves. It is as if a skin had been peeled away; sometimes painfully, we have come face to face with our own vulnerability and precariousness. A boy dies in hospital without his family and is buried without them; relatives look through windows at their loved ones in residential homes; people say farewell to the gravely ill by Skype.
We can no longer pretend to ourselves we are self-sufficient, autonomous, invincible and in control. More helpless, more exposed, more reliant on the generosity of others and aware of own mortality, we can speak things we previously kept hidden. We can ask ourselves what really matters in this world of ours that we all hold in common.
A mighty collective experience draws everyone together and the brief crisis-driven experience of isolation may have given us more empathetic understanding of what it is to be truly alone and on the margins of society.
These days will come to an end. We will be able to travel the country, swim in the sea, sit in each other’s rooms, lean over tables in restaurants and pubs, dance, hug each other at last with bodies that are no longer contagious. But we mustn’t go back to the world that we were living in before or unlearn the hard-won lessons of collaboration, kindness, empathy and human vulnerability. We mustn’t stop seeing and valuing the delivery driver, the hospital cleaner, the residential worker, the woman at the checkout, the neighbour over the fence, the stranger on the other side of the road, the person in need, the old and the frail and the forgotten, those hidden in life’s shadows. We can do it better. No going back. Nicci Gerrard

Blest be the tie that binds

*** The green yew, mighty oaks, tall deer, quiet does, trapped trout, sweet sloes and honey, black winged beetles, small bees and fine white gulls all sea singing. A 6th century description of the Irish countryside. ***

Prayers
Lord of every human heart take our stumbling generosity and simple acts of kindness and use them as best you can for Your purposes of love. pm.

Prayer in Times of Trouble
God of wind and water, stillness and storm, your Spirit sweeps over the surface of the sea. Give us faith to seek you in times of trouble. Reach out your hand to us when we are sinking that we may believe and worship you, through Jesus Christ, Sovereign and Saviour. (Matthew 14:22-33)

Today I include a request for prayers for those whose income is depleted and who are facing hardship; for those whose medical care is impacted by risk of Covid 19 as treatments or surgery are postponed; those who are finding the isolation and worry hard to bear as well as those mourning loved ones. Remember folks whose families live a long way away and all who are denied access to family members in hospital or in the crematorium or at a graveside. Pray for those who are daily exposed because of their work and their families in their concern for them. Add them to your chain of prayer and allow the Spirit of God to prompt you to remember them throughout your day.