Silver and Gold: Lent Daybook 7
Take a few deep breaths, settle your body, mind, and heart into a quiet space, and let’s begin with prayer.
Opening prayer: Heavenly Father, make me more like Jesus and more like the true self you’ve created as I savor your loving presence today. Please guide my thoughts and impressions by your Holy Spirit. Amen.
Look: Moses Smashing the Tablets of the Law, Rembrandt - Source | Expulsion of the Moneychangers from the Temple, Luca Giordano - Source
Listen: Justice Delivers Its Death, Joseph - Lyrics | Spotify | YouTube
Read: Psalm 45; Psalm 47, 48; Deuteronomy 9:4-12; Hebrews 3:1-11; John 2:13-22
Excerpts:
Gird your sword on your thigh, O mighty one, in your glory and majesty.
In your majesty ride on victoriously for the cause of truth and to defend the right; let your right hand teach you dread deeds. Your arrows are sharp in the heart of the king’s enemies; the peoples fall under you.
Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever. Your royal scepter is a scepter of equity; you love righteousness and hate wickedness.
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Clap your hands, all you peoples; shout to God with loud songs of joy. For the Lord, the Most High, is awesome, a great king over all the earth. He subdued peoples under us and nations under our feet. He chose our heritage for us, the pride of Jacob whom he loves.
Selah
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Remember; do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God to wrath in the wilderness; you have been rebellious against the Lord from the day you came out of the land of Egypt until you came to this place.
“Even at Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, and the Lord was so angry with you that he was ready to destroy you. When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord made with you, I remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water. And the Lord gave me the two stone tablets written with the finger of God; on them were all the words that the Lord had spoken to you at the mountain out of the fire on the day of the assembly. At the end of forty days and forty nights the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant. Then the Lord said to me, ‘Get up; go down quickly from here, for your people whom you have brought from Egypt have acted corruptly. They have been quick to turn from the way that I commanded them; they have cast an image for themselves.’
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God has gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet. Sing praises to God, sing praises; sing praises to our King, sing praises. For God is the king of all the earth; sing praises with a psalm.
God is king over the nations; God sits on his holy throne. The princes of the peoples gather as the people of the God of Abraham. For the shields of the earth belong to God; he is highly exalted.
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Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says,
“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, as on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your ancestors put me to the test, though they had seen my works for forty years. Therefore I was angry with that generation, and I said, ‘They always go astray in their hearts, and they have not known my ways.’ As in my anger I swore, ‘They will not enter my rest.’ ”
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Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God. His holy mountain, beautiful in elevation, is the joy of all the earth, Mount Zion, in the far north, the city of the great King. Within its citadels God has shown himself a sure defense.
Then the kings assembled; they came on together. As soon as they saw it, they were astounded; they were in panic; they took to flight; trembling took hold of them there, pains as of a woman in labor, as when an east wind shatters the ships of Tarshish. As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God, which God establishes forever.
Selah
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The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, with the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”
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We ponder your steadfast love, O God, in the midst of your temple. Your name, O God, like your praise, reaches to the ends of the earth. Your right hand is filled with victory. Let Mount Zion be glad; let the towns of Judah rejoice because of your judgments.
Walk about Zion; go all around it; count its towers; consider well its ramparts; go through its citadels, that you may tell the next generation that this is God, our God forever and ever. He will be our guide forever.
—Psalm 45:3-7a; Psalm 47:1-4; Deuteronomy 9:7-12; Psalm 47:5-9; Hebrews 3:7-11; Psalm 48:1-8; John 2:13-22; Psalm 48:9-14
Pray: A Body Prayer from Julian of Norwich (adapted from this source)
Read the brief introduction and then, knowing that you are held body, mind, and emotions in the presence of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit hold each pose of the prayer for 1-2 minutes. You can pray this prayer from your bed, your exercise mat, or wherever you find yourself today.
“An interesting example of Christian body prayer comes from Julian of Norwich, who lived during the time of the plague in England in the 14th c. Julian experienced severe bodily pain when she was thirty years old, during which she received visions, which she later recorded in Revelations of Divine Love. Julian wrote, "The fruit and the purpose of prayer is to be "oned" with God in all things."
Julian's Body Prayer is comprised of four poses and intentions: Await, Allow, Accept, and Attend.
The first pose, Await, is a posture of receiving, held with cupped hands extended at the waist to receive the presence of God.
The second pose, Allow, is a posture of opening, reaching up with the hands open to the coming of God's presence.
The third pose, Accept, takes in whatever comes, standing with hands cupped at the heart, head bowed.
The final posture, Attend, is assumed with hands extended and palms open in willingness to act on what has been given.
Once you have completed each pose, consider signing the cross over your head and heart in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and go back into your day with peace.
Do: Fast TV & Entertainment this week; feast on reading instead!
I’ve tried to suggest one practice a week that can fit along with whatever other fasts you may be undertaking this Lent. There’s merit in committing simply to one fast for the entire forty days. For example, we give up processed sugar and alcohol and then fast from one meal on Fridays.
Sometimes we need a little help imagining what a fast can look like and how it might produce good fruit in our lives. Each week this Lent, I’ll share one specific suggestion for fasting one habit in order to feast on a corresponding practice. You might decide to stay with that fast for the entire forty days, or you might choose just one or two days to try what I’ve suggested.
This week, I’m encouraging us to fast from television (or another form of entertainment) in order to read some poems or good books instead. Pray for God to gift you with a rested mind and an enlarged imagination for His good gifts in the world.
Suggested reading to feast on this week:
*Sunday Scripture readings are taken from Year A of the Book of Common Prayer 2019 (Anglican Church of North America). Daily Scripture readings are taken from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and include both Morning and Evening Psalms (Year 1).
**You might also enjoy:
David's Crown: Sounding the Psalms by Malcolm Guite