Psalm 27:4  One thing I asked of the Lord, that I will seek after: to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.

The Northumbria Community (NC) has some wonderful materials, including a Prayer CD that we used while creating our Daily Prayer Audio. Why not give today’s Northumbria Community evening prayer (HERE) a try whenever you get a chance during the day (you don’t have to wait until evening!)   🙂

Enjoy the day, filled with the Spirit!

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Lectionary Texts for Sunday, January 22, 2017:

[Christian Playbook posts over the next few weeks will focus on a prayer theme…]

A treasured book in my collection is A Pocket Prayer Book, given to our dad by his pastor in the early 1950s. The wonderful thing? Words of prayer really just haven’t changed that much!***

However, today’s technology can improve our access and experiences with prayers. The Prayer of St. Francis, contained in A Pocket Prayer Book is said with accompanying gestures in this YouTube video by Tom Sparough (Space Painter.) For many, the movements strengthen the prayer experience.

So maybe today during your conversations with God, a few gestures will find their way into the time together, using the video above or some prayers and movements of your own creation? 🙂

May it be a great day, filled Christ Jesus-centered purpose!

***[HERE’S a nice poem out of that book, written by Ralph Spaulding Cushman]

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A year ago we pointed to this UMC website article about finding more time to pray.

Seedbed.com shares a daily post that includes actions and prayers. Check it out HERE and maybe you’ll like one of the examples so much that you’ll do a free, daily subscription for a while?

Having said that, here’s one other tip to share as it relates to internet resources: consider setting up a free email account (gmail, yahoo, etc.) and pointing all of your Christian resource materials to that email address. That way, when you do go to Christian materials you can stay focused on those and you can try a whole bunch of daily/regular Christian emails and not worry about cluttering your personal email account.

Whatever you do, here’s hoping you enjoy the day, filled with the Spirit!

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The work that Alive Now does with Audio Lectio will be sadly missed by our community once that publication is done. We can hope that Upper Room will provide this in some other way? 🙂

You can listen to this Sunday’s gospel lesson (Matthew 3:13-17 “Baptism of the Lord”) HERE: http://alivenow.upperroom.org/audio-lectio/ The three readers do an excellent job of sharing this lesson and the guided discussion is wonderful.

John the Baptist obeyed despite his objections. Think of times you’ve balked at something you know you really should do. Maybe the Spirit will move through us today based on taking in John’s lesson? 🙂

Enjoy the day, filled with the Spirit!

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Today’s “A Prayer for a Leader” (UCC devotional) spurs nice reminders from Psalm 72 regarding justice, compassion and peace. May those characteristics emanate from all our leaders in the coming years!

This is the prayer at the end of the devotional:

Prayer

God of all nations, as the Psalm affirms, give our leaders—and us—your justice, your compassion for the poor, and your passion for peace. Amen.

Perhaps this is a prayer to be said today and in the days ahead?

May we all – fueled by the Spirit – seek justice, show compassion and pursue peace!