Advent Year B: Week 3: Litany for Deep Joy

God, all kinds of feelings pass through us in this life:
From happiness to sorrow and everything in between.
We can look around and see all kinds of reasons not to feel joyful
Until we learn:
Joy is not felt
Joy is found.

We straighten our spines,
Posturing ourselves toward joy;
Needing constant rediscovery
Until it becomes our nature.

Joy in pain
Joy in transformation
Joy in journeying
Joy in growth
Joy in parting
Joy in waiting

This is the joy that wells up from us:
The intentional song
The thoughtful gift
The word of comfort
The broken thing mended
The belly filled.

This is the joy given to us:
To love and be loved
To sacrifice and be blessed
To be lost and found.

Joyful, Joyful!
Rejoice, Rejoice!

Amen

 

Litany for Fat Tuesday

This litany was originally posted at Godspace. Happy Mardi Gras!

God,
We revel in your expansive grace;
We bask in your boundless love;
We delight in the excess of your blessings to us.

As Christ turned water to wine at Cana,
So You are spreading out a bountiful feast for Your people.

We acknowledge that your kingdom is
    always expanding
    always welcoming
    always inviting
    always growing  
    always blessing
    always filling.

We acknowledge that in Your presence there is always
    a joyful song
    a chorus of worship
    a fountain of life.

We acknowledge that your attitude toward us is always
    joyful celebration
    unconditional love
    wholehearted acceptance.

The universe is bursting, drunk with Your love.
Our hearts are plump, satisfied with Your love.
Our lives are filled up, ripe with Your blessing.

May we live our lives in the fullness of joy.
Amen

Litany for Gratitude

To You, O God, we give thanks.

We give thanks for the morning, when joy comes to us.
We give thanks for the evening, when we meditate on your love.
We give thanks for the in-between, the working hours, the accomplishing hours; when we must practice gratitude amidst distraction and busyness.
We give thanks for the long dark of night, when our souls and bodies assimilate and regenerate.

We give thanks for the people we love effortlessly, but also for the people who chafe and challenge us.
We give thanks for our enemies, who teach us to bless and forgive.
We give thanks for our families, who teach us grace and forbearance.
We give thanks for those whose lives we touch only momentarily - may we be a lasting blessing.

We give thanks for the boisterous, jubilant seasons. 
We give thanks for the subtle, quiet seasons. 
We give thanks for the seasons of difficulty and pain. 
May we emerge from each bearing the image of Christ Jesus.

We give thanks both when we are certain, and when uncertainty plagues us; both in the black and white, and in the gray.

We give thanks to You, acknowledging that every drop and morsel that sustains us comes from Your hand; that our place in the universe exists because You created it; and that Your purposes exceed the bounds of our imagining.

Litany for Those Who Dislike Their Jobs

You, God, created work.
You worked, and you rested, and you called it good.

We acknowledge our dissatisfaction with the work in front of us now.
We acknowledge that all honest work is good work.
We acknowledge the ways our hearts desire meaning and fulfillment from our work.
We acknowledge our desire to be useful in the world, and our hope of a legacy.

Help us to be patient when we must be patient.
Help us to make change at the proper time.
Help us to be faithful with a little, so that we may be granted more later.
Help us to care for those around us now, whom you have placed inside our sphere of influence, if only temporarily.
Help us to discern what is acceptable discomfort, and what is destructive.
Help us to discern whether it is our attitude or our situation that requires change.

Bring to us peace and prosperity, in whatever form You choose. We offer to you our health: emotional, physical, financial, relational, spiritual.  May your hand be upon us.

May we say with truth, “I am content in whatever my circumstances,” and “I have run with perseverance the race marked out before me.”
May we press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus.
May we be rich in good works, generous and ready to share.

May our work please you, and may it bring us joy.

Amen