the christian calendar on Snow

Pastor: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. All: Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! ...

One Christmas Eve in Vermont when my children were small, we did the things you do when your children are small on Christmas Eve. We stuffed and hung their stockings. We put out a draught of cider and...

A contemporary Ash Wednesday service integrating music and scripture with the imposition of ashes.  Service Order Prelude People are encouraged to enter in silence. Lights are dim. As people ...

Leader: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions. People: Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my si...

Many years ago a great Arctic explorer started on an expedition to the North Pole. After two long years in the lonely northland, he wrote a short message, tied it under the wing of a carrier pigeon, a...

Leader: Trusting in God’s tender mercy, let us confess our sin to God with one another. All: Gracious God, We confess the darkness and cold in our lives. Like barren trees in winter, we d...

“Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”  It’s a simple question. It’s also a question on everyone’s minds in the gospels. But it hits differently when you remember who asks i...

We know in­stinctively that Christmas is more than shopping mall Santas, silver bells, and snow-flocked trees, but such things are so entangled with our impressions of Christmas that it’s hard to kn...

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...

I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not nigh:a star shall come out of jacob. Numbers 24:17 KSV No star is visible except at night, Until the sun goes down, no accurate north. Da...

Christmas in Bethlehem. The ancient dream: A cold, clear night made brilliant by a glorious star, the smell of incense, shepherds and wise men falling to their knees in adoration of the sweet baby, th...

We have been having  epiphanies like suns, all this year long. And now, at its close  when the planets  are shining through frost, light runs like music in the bones,  and the heart ke...

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...

Moonless darkness stands between. Past, the Past, no more be seen! But the Bethlehem-star may lead me To the sight of Him Who freed me From the self that I have been. Make me pure, Lord: Thou art holy...

Christmas, like God himself, is both more wondrous and more threatening than we imagine.

Leader: "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light: upon those who live in the land of the shadow of death, a light has shined." People: "For to us a child is born, to us...

Late on a sleepy, star-spangled night, those angels peeled back the sky just like you would tear open a sparkling Christmas present. Then, with light and joy pouring out of Heaven like water through a...

Now Christmas is come, Let us beat up the drum, And call all our neighbors together, And when they appear, Let us make them such cheer, As will keep out the wind and the weather.

“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...

The season of Advent means there is something on the horizon the likes of which we have never seen before… .What is possible is to not see it, to miss it, to turn just as it brushes past you. And you ...

Just when everything is bearing down on us to such an extent that we can scarcely withstand it, the Christmas message comes to tell us that all our ideas are wrong, and that what we take to be evil an...

…How still the Landscape stands! How nonchalant the hedge! As if the “Resurrection” Were nothing very strange!

Arise, Brothers and Sisters, for your light has come! The Glory of the Lord rises upon you. Do not let the darkness that covers the earth cover your faith. Do not allow the thick darkness that is over...

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!

It was a time like this,  war and tumult of war,  a horror in the air. Hungry yawned the abyss— and yet there came the star  and the child most wonderfully there. It was a time like this ...

Pastor: In the dark and quiet of this holy night, we gather to worship in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. People: Amen. Pastor: We celebrate that when the fullness of time...

‘A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter… …All this was a long time ago, I reme...

A Blue Christmas Service is offered especially for those hurting during the holidays. It’s often offered December 21, the longest night of the year. Some come because they are mourning the death of...

The shepherds sing and shall I silent be? My God, no hymn for thee? My soul’s a shepherd too; a flock it feeds Of thoughts, and words, and deeds. The pasture is they word; the streams, thy grace Enric...

Leader: On this Christmas morning we worship in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. People: Amen. Leader: Glory to God in the Highest! People: And peace to those on whom His...