(I remember in 2013, asking everyone I knew to use liturgy for Pentecost that avoided fire as imagery because of how it triggered so many whose wildfire-fighter family and friends had died. We’ve-always-done-it-that-way with some holy parable is not actually being faithful to the text. This year I felt the same way (personal choice) on Pentecost and continue through the Season of Pentecost to avoid wind as a metaphor, knowing full well that the winds of death and destruction come from our own trampling the environment and heating of the planet, but that it is always more important that people are grieving.)
God, in this season of Pentecost,
I am so grateful to the prophet Elijah
who promises
God is not in the wind,
and I lift up to you those who grieve
loss of life and home,
school, workplace, even playground,
by wind and storm.
I ask you to plant
a mustardeed of comfort in each one,
weep, retrieve and rejoice over
all the lost coins of heart
found in new ways, and
knead the leaven of daily hope.
God, through these Pentecost days
remind us of the fruit of the Spirit,
for we are trying to put forth
the buds of the church.
Lift us with the wings of the Spirit,
for we must rise above sorrow
on bent feathers and love.
Confuse us
with how many languages
the Spirit speaks,
so we listen to our neighbors,
and discover a neighbor
in every stranger. Amen.
A Still Day
Gifts in Open Hands 