Author: rkcdlitt

Praise the Lord; how many times have I heard that. It sounds just like a good luck charm. What a shame! My idea of praising the Lord is manifold.

Primarily, I accept what St. Paul says when he says that Jesus himself is peace. This is the first concept we have to accept if we want to offer praise. Be peaceful; peace in all we do. Peace for all humanity and all of God’s creation.

Next, we must bow down and worship, kneeling (if possible) before the Lord our creator. Silent prayer is what I believe God listens to the most. My prayers are silent; I ask for nothing; after giving thanks for a new life each morning, I let my mind be absorbed by God’s presence within me. I let God speak to me in prayer. This is a powerful way to pray.

Finally, when praying in church, synagogue, or temple, sing (or chant) a song to God. Singing God’s song is one of the greatest way group prayer works. In my Episcopal church, the psalms we sing are praises to and not requests from God. God listens; God Loves; God loves our songs and chants to Him. In the songs and chants, God reassures us of His promises and His Grace and Care for us.

Praise the Lord – shh – Praise the Lord.

Amen.

© Russell Kendall Carter

During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus reminds us to let our lights shine among all people; then He says to glorify God. This is my daily prayer. What do I need to hope for when God’s Love is all around? This prayer liberates God’s creation from man’s tendency to bring decay to the earth and with the promise to God’s children to bring freedom and glory to celebrate His glorious rebirth to our world.

Glorious God, as we prepare to celebrate the birth of your Son, open all our hearts to the holiness of Your creation. We praise Your presence with us always. Allow us to share your salvation with all humanity. As it is said, “God in front of you, God behind you, God above you, God within you.” Our vision is that the entire world is Your sacred creation.

Dear God, my one more prayer is not a request or a thank you. It is a blessing for others. My all humanity feel the blessed love of God as I do.

© Russell Kendall Carter

During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus reminds us to let our lights shine among all people; then He says to glorify God. This is my daily prayer. What do I need to hope for when God’s Love is all around? This prayer liberates God’s creation from man’s tendency to bring decay to the earth and with the promise to God’s children to bring freedom and glory to celebrate His glorious rebirth to our world.

Glorious God, as we prepare to celebrate the birth of your Son, open all our hearts to the holiness of Your creation. We praise Your presence with us always. Allow us to share your salvation with all humanity. As it is said, “God in front of you, God behind you, God above you, God within you.” Our vision is that the entire world is Your sacred creation.

© Russell Kendall Carter

The light of all people shines on a bright Christmas morning. As the shepherds I the fields, the world is filled with wonder, the wonder of a grace-filled God born among us to suffer the hardships of mortal life. This is not just an experience for those of us who are called Christians. This light is for all people, all of God’s creation. Nothing can separate us from God’s Love and Grace. The Love that Jesus brings is so massive and so bright, we must close our eyes and see it with our hearts.

Only the majesty of this loving God can invite us to understand it, then, and only then, can we out our trust in the message that Jesus brings. As Christians, our God-given duty is to pray that others will be opened to realize and be strengthened by this Love. We must not force them to do so; we must only offer God’s invitation to do so. The Spirit of God is within us all to realize when we listen for His words with our open hearts.

Jesus asks that we love God, love ourselves, and love one another. We cannot love God, nor can we love Jesus, if we do not love one another. That means that no matter what a person looks like, what religion or gender that person is, or what color that person is, he/she is invited to hear the light of Jesus and the light of God wit their open hearts. If we do not love one another, we cannot absolutely love God, for God created all on this earth and love and respect for all His creation is all He asks of us. Remember, Love is the very character of God.

We spiritually climb to the heights of the His holy mountain to truly feel the warmth of Love that is all around us. We step carefully to show respect for God’s creation. We feel the warmth and bask in the light that only God can give, and Jesus can bring to us. The Lord our God will keep us from all harm and watch over us for eternity. This is the message of Jesus.

©Russell Kendall Carter

During Advent we await the fulfillment of God’s promise. Sometimes, I wonder why we do not share this the rest of the year. God’s gift is life; this life is filled with the presence of the Holy Spirit within us, individually and as a group. I am aware of the presence every morning, thanking God for another day in His wonderful creation.

I am grateful for this presence that lets my light shine within and without. God’s presence pts me on the true path of love and kindness toward all whom I meet. God cares for you; God cares for me. When we accept and share this our days are blessed and fulfilled with goodness. Jesus asks us to have to love and recognize the divine image even in our enemies. This is true fulfillment of God’s presence and love. As Luke writes: “Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth. . .” (3:5).

© Russell Kendall Carter

Dear Lord, why does society avoid the quartet of the vulnerable? Why are widows, orphans, immigrants, and the poor ignored by society; why does society oppress this forgotten foursome? Our Lord’s prayer ends with the promise that God’s will be done, on earth, as in heaven. Yet, in our lives, we overlook and shun these souls that are before us every day.

God gives us strength to remain upright through all the trials that torment us on a daily basis. Jesus gave us the second great commandment, to love others as ourselves. We do not love ourselves when we oppress this quartet of the vulnerable. In biblical times, the Israelites kept their doors open and a place at their table for the stranger, the unexpected guest, perhaps waiting for the Messiah or a godly prophet. This represented true godly compassion and love for those lost in a modern society. Yes, modern for their times. Yet, in our modern society, we have no room for this person.

I am just as guilty as others on this. I fear inviting the unannounced stranger into my home. The open violence in society strikes fear in my heart. In feeling this way and not doing what is right, I sin against the word and love of God; I sin against his trust and protection. I try to cover this sin by donating liberally to all programs that aid the poor and oppressed, the homeless, and the frail. But this does not reverse my sin.

So, I pray, and I meditate, and I write. I use these holy gifts to soften my lack of action, my lack of accepting the stranger. And I pray that God will look kindly on me.

© Russell Kendall Carter

As I examine our society, I sometimes think that justice is just a game to our leaders. Even some of our religious leaders seem to be toxic when it comes to justice. All of this selective justice should shame us. But today there is a presence on our lives that presents us with justice with a kind and loving hand. During this holy time of Advent, we bring peace and justice for all. During this beloved season, all religions join in the celebration of rebirth and promise, love, and justice.

The birth of Jesus binds us God’s holy creation, the one bringing us the Divine connecting us for eternity. The tender Mercy and Love graciously given by God brings us a new dawn each day bringing light to all in darkness. God cares for you; God cares for me. When we share God’s Grace and Justice, we shine a light on all humanity.

© Russell Kendall Carter

The word path in French is chemin, which also means approach. How we approach this Advent season can liberate us from the bondage of our societal prejudices. During Advent, we read our Bibles the enlightening story of the birth of Jesus. What we forget is that His birth is not just for humanity; it is for all of God’s creation.

If we follow the lighted path that Jesus shows us, we are at peace with ourselves and society. We are made in god’s image; therefore, we grow in that image daily. Jesus’s path brings true hope, true peace, and true freedom.

Dear God, may we walk on the way light-filled path shown to us by your Son.

© Russell Kendall Carter

Wandering in the Desert

We wander through our lives, looking, looking, waiting, waiting. For What? Humanity shares a closely hidden, protected secret; we pretend, we put on a minstrel’s face, hiding the fact that in our society, humanity suffers with the sickness of the human spirit. We care little for those on the bottom rungs of society, as long as we are safe. We ignore the language of the poor which is entreaty. We hide behind our castles, protected by our artificial strongholds against anything that may challenge us, or harm us.

Our lives are like the desert; we wander aimlessly looking for something to soothe our tender frailties. We pretend we know; we pretend we are saved because we are upright members of our local churches. But the strongholds we build are only facades in our minds. We are not protected by these artificial castles. We will never find water in these arid deserts we roam.

We neglect the second greatest commandment given to us by Jesus; “Love thy neighbor as we love ourselves.” Every day I stop my car and give a few dollars to the poor man pleading for help; I wish I could give more; sometimes I do not see them and wonder where they have gone. This is the man, this is the family, that our humanity must open its ears to, hearing the pleading for assistance.

Governments are too greedy to lift these people from poverty. Big business is too interested in giving massive bonuses to the already superrich. And the churches can only give minor assistance; they too have to count pennies to remain alive. Humanity must clothe the poor, feed them, house them, to relieve their suffering. I can afford to give a few dollars each day to the poor man pleading for assistance. Imagine what it would be like if all of us stopped to give these poor people a few dollars from our material wealth. Three hundred and fifty million people giving a few dollars a day to help those in need. That is almost two and a half billion dollars . . . a day.

Imagine what good that could be doing. Imagine what our society would look like if we respected the poor, treating them with dignity, not demonizing them.

Let us stop wandering in our personal deserts.

© Russell Kendall Carter

When we are healthy humans, we can live well into our eighties, but only if we have the inner resolve to do this. This inner resolve is soul, and this soul is God, or at least God-given. I am a young seventy-eight-year-old man who suffers with chronic pain on a daily basis, but I am blessed to have the living God within me, giving me a strong soul to cope with life.

On a daily basis, I feel a thousand faculties of energy leap into my very being. This is a true gift of life in God’s presence. As Teresa of Avila reminds us, if we want to find God and all his promises, we must look inside ourselves for the divine presence that only God can give. God acts within me; however, I have to remember that my frame of time is not God’s time. Peter tells us that God is not slow to act or keep the Holy promise of eternal life. What we call a day could be a millennium to God. And what God calls a day is a millennium in our collective existence. The promise of God is eternal. Therefore, my soul, which is His possession within me, is also eternal.

© Russell Kendall Carter