Give us Grace

Yesterday Tom and I were at lunch with friends. The conversation turned to answering the question, “what do you most look forward to about being in the Thousand Islands?”One of our companions, a retired Episcopal priest who is quite erudite, and even a bit enigmatic at times, said, “I love to read. I try to do it all day.”

There are many great things about life at Thousand Island Park. The porch is one, the re-connection with neighbors and friends is another. Long walks and river breezes are two more. Swimming is definitely a great thing here. The list could go on and on.

But maybe our luncheon guest is on to something about reading. It’s as if there’s more time...and I admit that I return to books I’ve read before, and read them as if they’re absolutely new. I suppose in a way they are. Give us Grace is an anthology of Anglican prayers compiled by Christopher L. Webber (Morehouse, 2004), and it’s a book I know quite well, but I never noticed the section of prayers from the Anglican Church in Kenya, until early this morning. Here’s a prayer from Kenya, a postcommunion prayer which leapt off the page. Maybe it will be for you a kind of grace today. Maybe today you’ll read something that’s old as if it’s completely new. I hope so:

Let us pray. 

O God of our ancestors, God of our people, before whose face the human generations pass away: We thank you that in you we are kept safe for ever, and that the broken fragments of our history are gathered up in the redeeming act of your dear Son, remembered in this holy sacrament of bread and wine. Help us to walk daily in the Communion of saints, declaring our faith in the forgiveness of sins, and the resurrection of the body. Now send us out in the power of your Holy Spirit to live and work for your praise and glory. Amen.