Sunday: Prayer & Worship
September 14
- Scripture: Psalm 34:1-3 — “I will extol the Lord at all times; his praise will always be on my lips. I will glory in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and rejoice.”
- Reflection: Prayer involves one of three aspects: requests for help (also called intercession), words of gratitude, and expressions of praise. Worship involves multiple forms of sharing communal exploration of the connection between our spiritual selves and our Creator, as well as deepening and expressing our thoughts and feelings with song, silence, messages, listening, and conversation. In many ways, worship is an encounter and a dialogue with the divine, that invites God’s presence into our lives.
What place in the world brings you closer to a the ‘sacred’ in the world? Or what activity becomes a doorway that opens your mind and heart to holy encounters? Integrate that place or that activity into a day of worship during the week.
If you wonder about how to discover the presence of God, consider these words by Sr. Joan Chittister. “We are steeped in God, but it takes so long to realize that the God we make in our own image is too small a God on which to waste our lives. God is the energy of the universe, the light in every soul, the eternal kaleidoscope of possibility that surrounds us in nature. The face of God is imprinted on the face of everyone we see. God is no one of them, and God is more than all of them, but without them, we miss all the tiny glimpses of God we’re being given on the way. “How easy it is to forget and disregard the divine beauty and light within ourselves and in the other,” Deborah Chu-Lan Lee wrote. It’s a simple insight, but the very ground of the spiritual life, I think. I have seen God’s mercy and justice, felt God’s love, and heard God’s voice—but always in the other. And all of them have grown me beyond myself. I’m not so sure that it’s “easy to forget” the Divine in the other. I think, given our formation in the potential pitfalls and essential weakness of matter, that it is more likely to be impossible to see it at all. But once we do, once we realize that we are surrounded by fragments of the Divine, life becomes luminous.” - Spiritual Practice: Choose one of the forms of prayer (asking for help, sharing gratitude, expressing praise) and initiate a conversation with God.
Song:
- Pray by Lauren Spencer Smith: https://youtu.be/Qcm30ftquCI?si=98Xonh-d28BfOMCr
Man is the most insane species. He worships an invisible God and destroys a visible Nature. Unaware that this Nature he’s destroying is this God he’s worshiping.” ― Hubert Reeves
Worship is the act of giving God the best of yourself. — Billy Graham
Sept 14 Daily Devotional