August 5th, 2007

Hands being folded in prayer. A powerful image.

It happened today when those who are in the service or setting up were all performing what needs to be done to prepare for worship.

I was practicing with Matt, our former Music Minister, who was filling in for Dave who was at a Jubilee workshop in Chicago. We finished well before worship and I saw a young woman in the sanctuary, hands folded, deep in prayer. It had been some time since I prayed before service. As I did, it made me wish we had time to pray in group prayer more often before services.

A few minutes after that Pastor Mark gathered the worship leaders for the service for a collective prayer. It set the tone for a special service.

Pastor Mark’s sermon was on the gospel, Luke 12:13-21 about a rich man who plans to build bigger barns to store the abundance of his possessions. I know I was not the only person thinking about Creator and its efforts with acquiring the historic barn next to us. Pastor Mark’s emphasis was on God’s care for creatures and life. As he said in the Children’s Time “God doesn’t care about the anthill but he does care about the ants.”

I enjoyed the music of the service and backing up Matt. It was the African American setting and it felt like the congregational energy was moving in some different ways than usual during the singing.

There was a quality about lifting the community rather than lifting each individual that I appreciated. Hard to put into words but definitely it was a strong feeling.