A Liturgy Before Feasting

(place your hand on your forehead)

O Great Author of Our Minds,
you made us with the capacity
to think and to dream,
to solve problems and to love people,
to process pain and to enjoy life,
to heal.

You gave us minds that we might know you.
So we pause now, hands on our heads,
and ask that you would touch
our fatigued, anxious, busy minds.

With each breath we take,
would you begin to renew our minds:
rewiring our neural pathways,
healing our memories,
and restoring our mental health.

(pause)

For our minds, we say: thank you.
Let’s eat, drink, and remember Jesus.

(take communion)

(place your hand on your heart)

O Great Author of Our Bodies,
you made us with the capacity
to play and to feel,
to love and be loved,
to see, smell, taste, and hear,
to touch and to be held.

So we pause now, hands on our hearts,
acknowledging the limits of our our bodies:
our bodies that get hungry and thirsty,
our bodies that we don’t always understand,
our bodies that break down,
our bodies that will all return to dust.

Within the halls of our bodies
let us hear the resounding echoes
of the gospel truth of our embodiment:
That in the beginning we were made
from the dust of the earth
to be flesh and blood, to be alive.

We pause now, asking for you to fill our bodies
with the reminder of your resurrection,
knowing that, one day, we too will rise.

(pause)

For our bodies, we say: thank you.
Let’s eat, drink, and remember Jesus.

(take communion)

(open your hands on your lap)

O Great Author of Our Desires,
you made us with the capacity to yearn.
We take a moment to offer you our desires – 
desires that will be met in this life
and desires that we choose to defer
for the sake of the Kingdom.

We envision, now, in our right hand,
open in our lap,
a longing that has not been met,
a desire that has not been filled.

(pause)

As it comes to mind, 
a sadness and anger stir within us.
And an anxiety also pleads that we
try to meet this need ourselves.

In the midst of these experiences, 
we extend our right hand, now,
and offer this desire to you in worship –
the worship of continuing to wait,
or the worship of surrendering again.

(pause)

We envision, now, in our left hand,
open in our lap,
a longing that has been answered,
a desire you have filled.

(pause)

As it comes to mind,
we are filled with the warmth of hope,
grateful for how you have provided.

And in the midst of these experiences,
we extend our left hand, now,
and offer this desire up to you in worship.

(pause)

God, from surface level longings
to longings that run deeper than we know,
our desires were made to remind us of you, 
the only One who can satiate.

May expectation grow in us
as we wait for the unfolding
of what is to come and of what could be.
Let these hearts within us yearn for you,
the horizon of our expectations.

We lift our eyes to you –
even though some of our desires 
remain distorted, unfulfilled, or painful –
believing as best we can
that one day each and every desire in us
will be filled as we are united with you forever.

For the desires that you have met
and – although we do not always know why –
for the desires that go unmet, we say: thank you.
Let’s eat, drink, and remember Jesus.

(take communion)

Amen.