05-01-23

ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
May 1, 2023
Prayer for the Week: As an introduction to the prayer of the week, I want to share what I did growing up on May 1. Some of you might have made May Baskets as I did. Usually the night before, we’d put together these baskets with candy, cookies, and some other special surprise. After school on May 1st, we would go to people’s homes and leave these anonymous baskets of care. I remember my mother explaining to me the joy of giving a gift with no strings attached—not even a string that would guide the receiver back to the giver. It was an act of grace, though mostly my mother’s grace, as she was the one who paid for the materials to make the baskets and the items to go in the baskets. Nonetheless, it provided me with a little hint of what it means to give unconditionally. May we all, not only on this May 1st, be about the business of teaching through example the transformative power that comes with giving without condition or reciprocation.

​We have met in Jesus, O God of the Universe and beyond, a love that, by its very nature, has no concept of condition or limitation. As those who continue to know the blessings and joy of such a gift, encourage our creativity in the enfleshing of this love. We desire for all the world and beyond to know the blessings and joy of this gift. Amen.