the christian calendar on Foolishness

Pastor: O wise and wonderful God, in our quick temper and selfish pride, we have not followed your example—you are slow to anger, abounding in love, and show steadfast faithfulness to your children. ...

Wise and all-knowing God, we confess our knowledge is limited. We don’t know what’s best. We don’t know how to control ourselves. We don’t know how to forgive. We don’t know how to love. And we don’t ...

God, you come to us and meet us in the strangest ways: sometimes in the stillness at the eye of the storm or in the midnight of our lives; sometimes in the raging whirlwind or in the high noon of our ...

We confess, O God, that the Christmas rush is typical of our efforts to live the Christian life. We pursue peace on earth, but we end up with frayed nerves and short tempers. We wish good will to all,...

What are you doing, O Magi? Do you adore a little Babe, in a wretched hovel, wrapped in miserable rags? Can this Child be truly God? … Are you become foolish, O Wise Men … Yes, these Wise Men have bec...

When fishes flew and forests walked And figs grew upon thorn, Some moment when the moon was blood Then surely I was born. With monstrous head and sickening cry And ears like errant wings, The d...

The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding.

The world has always despised people from the wrong places and with the wrong credentials. We are always trying to justify ourselves. We need desperately to feel superior to others. And everything abo...

Since failure is our unforgivable sin, we are willing to ignore all forms of deviance in people if they just achieve the success symbols which we worship.

Call to Confession: The prophet asks the Lord’s people, “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap.” ...

Lord of Hosts, We come before you today in a tone of solemnity. We recognize that while it was Judas who betrayed you for 30 pieces of silver, that we often betray you as well. We know what is right,...

In his book of sermons titled The Magnificent Defeat, Frederick Buechner mentions two qualities of childlikeness. First, children have no fixed preconceptions of reality. If someone tells them that ...

Yet for all that, God, for the salvation of them that were in error, endured to be served by these things, whereby those without were used to serve devils; only He slightly altered them; that He might...

The idea that there’s a force of love and logic behind the universe is overwhelming to start with, if you believe it. Actually, maybe even far-fetched to start with, but the idea that that same love a...

The other day I took a tumble. Fortunately, there were no witnesses. Now I’m walking with a limp. If ever there was a case of falling down it was Jesus. Some were saying He was the Son of God. They e...

Pastor: O Spirit of God, help my infirmities. When I am pressed down because of my sin, perplexed and not knowing what to do, help me. All: When you see that I desire evil things, delighting in sinf...

If you lacked simplicity, how then should this fall to you that midnight skies are a shine with? God, who stoked at men mild in you now comes to mortal eyes. That he’s not more great—does this surpris...

Faith is a voluntary anticipation.

Strange, this familiar Father of prodigals whose love, too much for one lifetime, wills that we shall share the feast of forgiveness and joy in the epilogue of eternity. Strange, this daily advent of ...

None climbs so high as he who knows not whither he is going.

“They will look toward the earth and see only distress, darkness, and the gloom of affliction, and they will be driven into thick darkness.” (Isa. 8:22) In The Two Towers , the second novel in Tolki...

Ash Wednesday is full of joy...The source of all sorrow is the illusion that of ourselves we are anything but dust.

Among the sheep (I like a sheep have strayed) I watch the manger where my Lord is laid; Oh that my baa-ing nature would win thence Some woolly innocence!

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and eve...

In the ancient world, a place where the veil between the earthly and spiritual was easily pierced, rumors and gossip about great leaders being born of the gods, especially amongst royals, was somewhat...

The Strain of Time Time marches forward for all of us, doesn’t it? There are 365 days in the Gregorian calendar. There are 365 days in the Liturgical calendar. While the respective beginnings and en...

Christians have no business thinking that the good life consists mainly in not doing bad things. We have no business thinking that to do evil in this world you have to be a Bengal tiger, when, in fact...

The idea that there's a force of love and logic behind the universe is overwhelming to start with, if you believe it. Actually, maybe even far-fetched to start with, but the idea that that same lo...

They hailed him King as he passed by,  They strewed their garments in the road,  But they were set on earthly things,  And he on God. They sang his praise for that he did,  But gave his mes...

At start of spring I open a trench in the ground. I put into it the winter’s accumulation of paper, pages I do not want to read. Again, useless words, fragments, errors. And I put into it the contents...