Pause

Pour your Spirit upon us, O Lord,

We are your sons and daughters.

Animate us with your gifts

To serve your people.

Listen

“Salt is good; but if salt loses its saltiness, how will it become salty again? Maintain salt among yourselves and keep peace with each other.”

Mark 9:50

Think

I learned a few years ago that the Russian word for “hospitable” literally translates to “bready-salty” – that is, a person who shares their bread and salt with their neighbors, a person who has salt in themselves. When we have salt in ourselves, it is easy to be hospitable and generous, because that salt becomes something we want to share with other people.

The hard part, sometimes, can be to receive the hospitality of others. In the Church, sometimes we focus so hard on remembering to offer what we have with our neighbors, that we forget how to be a good guest when they have something to offer us. But hospitality is not just about good hosting, it’s also about good guesting. We are truly on the same team, and truly at peace with one another, when we become vulnerable enough to receive as well as give.

Jordan Haynie Ware

Pray

Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world: Evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

Go

Breathe upon us, breath of God,

young and old alike.

Send us forth, gifted with your power,

To serve your people.