Tag Archives: trust

Blessing While Searching for Home

26 Monday Jul 2021

Posted by in grief, Reflections

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Dallis on Hanalei Beach, Kauai (2017)

Blessing While Searching for Home

When we fell in love
it was a long and lovely fall
tumbling heart first
into a trust so deep and wide
neither of us recognized it at first.

Here where the soul is bare
and unashamed
and caught off guard 
by the beauty of another
we discovered home
for the first time in our lives.

It is not to be taken for granted –
this serendipity of finding
what we knew our souls needed
but had never been able to find –
a shelter from the storm,
a refuge amid life’s troubles,
a sanctuary of healing grace.

Your dying
shook the foundations
of this home we fashioned
out of love and sweat
and laughter and tears.

Now many questions travel with me
in this liminal territory I’ve entered –
where am I to turn for shelter,
how will I recover a sense of home,
how do I cultivate a circle of trust,
how does one pray with a heart bereft,
how do I travel this long, lonely road?

Travel with me, sweetheart.
Please, I pray, travel with me,
as I wait for answers 
and go in search of them.

Travel with me, sweetheart,
and in the traveling
hold these questions with me
until a new dawn arrives.

Travel with me
and be home for me,
and in the sweet mystery of love
be home with me.

Mark Lloyd Richardson
July 27, 2021

An Ash Wednesday Prayer

14 Wednesday Feb 2018

Posted by in Prayers

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God of all creation,
you are gracious and merciful, slow to anger,
and you abound in steadfast love.

Today as I enter the closet of my heart,
I discover a lifetime of memories stored there –
some I would prefer to forget and leave behind,
others that remind me how truly blessed I am.

Today I hear again your invitation to renewal –
I hear it with every fiber of my being,
having been created in your image,
formed of the dust of your earth,
enlivened by the breath of your spirit,
established in the strength of your grace!

In these forty days of Lent, it is my heart’s desire
to surrender old harmful habits that yield nothing,
and to take up new holy habits that lead to life.

May this Lenten journey return me to a place of trust,
where my fear is conquered by your holy unshakable love,
where I am healed and made whole in the aliveness of life,
where doing justice,
and loving mercy,
and walking humbly with you,
are the ways of being that matter most.

 Hands2a

Copyright (c) 2012 Mark Lloyd Richardson

That We Might Be Healers Too

05 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Poems, Prayers

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Pali Coast

Pali Coast, Kauai

The world of your creating is beautiful, O God.

You are master sculptor of imposing mountain ranges,
rugged seascapes, luxuriant valleys, bubbling volcanoes.

You give thought to the birds of the air,
the cattle on the hill, the sea creatures and crawling things.

You orchestrate the sights and sounds of creation
to be a harmonious symphonic masterpiece
that all might know the abundance of your goodness.

There is no detail you leave unattended,
no part of this world beyond your concern.

And amazingly,
you are mindful of human beings –
made in your image,
made for relationship,
made of dust and water,
made of breath and hope,
made of dreams for becoming,
made to live at peace,
made to create,
made with a spark of divinity,
made with a twinkle in your eye,
made to hold and to heal,
made to trust,
made from a deep abiding love.

Our burdens begin
when we misplace our mindfulness of you.

Anxieties follow
when we forget who it is who holds our lives.

Troubles mount
when we boast that this is all meant for us.

Sorrows breed
when we ignore what you intend for our wholeness.

Heal us.
Shake us from our complacency.
Renew in us a vision of life’s harmony.
Restore in us a thriving hopefulness.
Stir up in us a righteous anger at injustice.
Prevent us from doing any more harm.
Call forth from us what is beautiful and true.
Lead us back to our sacredness.
Heal us, we pray, that we might be healers too.

Mark Lloyd Richardson
(c) 2017

God of wind and wave

23 Saturday Jun 2012

Posted by in Prayers, Worship Liturgy

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Here is an Opening Prayer for use in worship tomorrow on the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, based on the Gospel reading from Mark 4:35-41.

God of wind and wave,
the seas of life can be rough some days,
tossing us here and there,
threatening our wellbeing,
troubling our minds and testing our hearts.

You are the One whom even the wind and sea obey!
You are the One whose words, “Peace! Be still!”
settle with calm resolve in our hearts today.
You turn our fear into faith, our trembling into trust.

We come in adoration, praise, and thanksgiving,
for your strong and tender presence,
your steadfast and durable love.
Amen.

Words (c) 2012 Mark Lloyd Richardson (Mark 4:35-41)
Photo (c) 2012 Dallis Day Richardson (Pacific Grove, California)
Permission to use the prayer in worship with attribution.

An Ash Wednesday Prayer

22 Wednesday Feb 2012

Posted by in Prayers

≈ 10 Comments

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God of all creation,
you are gracious and merciful, slow to anger,
and you abound in steadfast love.

Today as I enter the closet of my heart,
I discover a lifetime of memories stored there –
some I would prefer to forget and leave behind,
others that remind me how truly blessed I am.

Today I hear again your invitation to renewal –
I hear it with every fiber of my being,
having been created in your image,
formed of the dust of your earth,
enlivened by the breath of your spirit,
established in the strength of your grace!

In these forty days of Lent, it is my heart’s desire
to surrender old harmful habits that yield nothing,
and to take up new holy habits that lead to life.

May this Lenten journey return me to a place of trust,
where my fear is conquered by your holy unshakable love,
where I am healed and made whole in the aliveness of life,
where doing justice,
and loving mercy,
and walking humbly with you,
are the ways of being that matter most.