Mike King

Right by my side and Don Chaffer

The song (prayer) Right by my Side has been with me non-stop since last Friday.  I had a dozen visitors with me at Youthfront South.  We went to Midday together and joined 300 high school students in the chapel for this prayer time.  We prayed theologically rich prayers of the church, declared our faith with the Apostles Creed, read a Resurrection narrative from Luke and embraced silence.  The prayer song was simple and beautiful.

I could run away   
You would never leave
You will always stay right by my side
Oh, right by my side
Right by my side
And I need You
I need You
Every step of the way
Everything I ever wanted I’ve found in You
Everything I ever wanted I’ve found in You 

I didn't want it to end.  It didn't, it is still going on inside me one week later.

I saw Micah Thomas over the weekend.  Micah leads the music.  He said something like, "It was kind of interesting leading Right by my SIde with Don Chaffer in the room."  That is when I found out Don wrote the song.  I am much more familiar with Don's music of the last five years since we have become friends.  I talked to Don yesterday and told him that I have been living in his song for a week now.  Since the song was written around nine years ago he was happy that he could still embrace those lyrics today.  That is significant when you are on a life-long journey.  He also talked about writing some new kind of liturgical music.  As we continue to develop our liturgy at Youthfront South I am hopeful for more of Don's work. 

If you are in the Kansas City area you can see another side of Don Chaffer, the artist, when the Khrusty Brother's perform.

August 15 - Voodoo Lounge
September 13 - Bottleneck 
September 20 - Crosstown Station

St. Patrick's Breastplate

Today in Midday, at YouthFront, we prayed a prayer of the church attributed to St. Patrick.  It was awesome.  In addition, all week during Holy Week our community at Jacob's Well is keeping the hours.  We get three text messages per day for morning, midday and evening prayer.  Here is a beautiful way to Pray St. Patrick's Breastplate on St. Patrick's Day or any day for that matter. 

ht Tony Jones

O God, Protect your Church

O God, you are the fountain of all truth; we ask you to protect your church from all false teaching.

Protect the Church 

From all teaching and preaching which would destroy men’s’ faith;
From all that removes the old foundations without putting anything in their place;
From all that confuses the simple, that perplexes the seeker, that bewilders the way-faring man, 

And yet at the same time protect the Church

From the failure to face new truth;
From devotion to words and ideas which the passing of the years has rendered unintelligible;
From all intellectual cowardice and from all mental lethargy and sloth. 

O God, send to your Church teachers,

Whose minds are wise with wisdom;
Whose hearts are warm with love;
Whose lips are eloquent with truth. 

Send to your Church teachers

Whose desire is to build and not to destroy;
Who are adventurous with the wise;
And yet gentle with the simple;
Who strenuously exercise the intellect,
And who yet remember that the heart has reasons of its own. 

Give to your Church preachers and teachers who can make known the Lord Christ to others because they know him themselves; and give to your Church hearers, who, being freed from prejudice, will follow truth as blind men long for light.

This we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

   

 

Prayers for the Christian Year by William Barclay

Evening Prayer

May God shield me; may God fill me; may God keep me; may God watch me; may God bring me this night to the nearness of His love.  Amen.

O Lord, our God...

O Lord, our God, You are always more ready to give your good gifts to us than we are ready to seek them, and you are willing to give more than we desire or deserve.  Help us to seek that we may find, to ask that we may joyfully receive, to knock that the door of your mercy may be opened to us. Amen.

Father WeeJus

Well done Tony.  I am with YOU! 

Read Tony Jones article in the Leadership Journal              entitled, Prayer Beyond Father WeeJus here. 

Following the Star

Check out the Following the Star Advent Prayer site... what a wonderful gift during this season.

National Day of Prayer

I almost classified this post in the category of "politics" because that would have been a more accurate description of the National Day of Prayer stuff I attended at the Capital in Washington, DC last Thursday.  I spent 53 minutes in the Caucus Room observing all the National Day of Prayer festivities led by Dr. James Dobson.  This is the second time I have attended the National Day of Prayer events on Capital Hill.  It is pretty bizarre to be sitting there and have Tom Delay walk in and sit down a couple seats from you (happened this year).   Fifty minutes after I entered the room we finally prayed.  The prayer last 46 seconds.  I left.  I walked around the Capital Building and Washington, DC praying on my own. 

Prayer of the Church

This is the Prayer of the Church we have been praying as a staff during Midday in April...

                          Prayer of the Church

Teach us, dear Lord, to number our days; that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Oh, satisfy us early with thy mercy, that we may rejoice and be glad all of our days. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us; and establish Thou the work of our hands. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us; and establish Thou the work of our hands, dear Lord.

Way of the cross...

So here we are at the beginning of Passion Week.  I hope that this will be a meaningful week as you contemplate the reality of Jesus Christ, God in human flesh suffering for the sins of the world, crucified, dead and buried.  During this week, one of the many things I do to live in the authenticity of the Passion of the Christ is to make the Stations of the Cross.

The following reflections on the way of the cross were sent to me by my friend Libbie Patterson who I serve with on the Soul Shaper Board.  Libbie based these meditations on Joan Chittister's book Way of the Cross: Gateway to Resurrection.

"The Stations of the Cross are simply an excursion through the hard moments of life as those periods are demonstrated in the life of Jesus himself....They give us a model of how to live life when our own suffering is unavoidable and life seems most impossible. Then, knowing that Jesus has gone the way of injustice, fatigue, failure and defeat before us, they give our present difficulties both new light and new hope." Joan Chittister, Gateway to Resurrection.

I Jesus is condemned to die. What is it in life for which we are willing to be condemned?

II Jesus carries his cross. Having begun a good thing, will I pay the price to bring it to fulfillment?

III Jesus falls the first time. Is the struggle of my life worth enough to struggle to the end?

IV Jesus meets his mother. Why do we love, and how well?

V Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry his cross. What are we being called to do for someone in need right now for which we are a disinclined observer? What does the situation have to offer us as well?

VI Veronica wipes the face of Jesus. Who is there - whose life you deplore

- that you have reached out to help?

VII Jesus falls the second time. Is there anything important enough for which we will endure even when it seems to be unattainable? Is there any pain worth more than the desire to run away from it?

VIII Jesus meets the weeping women of Jerusalem. Do we really reject what we call sinful or do we really reject only the sinners themselves?

IX Jesus falls the third time. Are we about something big enough to be worth every effort of our lives? If we are not involved in something that demands the unstinting best of us and threatens the very core of us, what is life about?

X Jesus is stripped of his garments. What is underneath the garments of pomp, authority, dignity and wealth that we have so carefully cultivated around us?

XI Jesus is nailed to the cross. Are we spending our lives, our hopes, our

emotions on something great enough to make the pain of losing them worthwhile?

XII Jesus dies on the cross. Am I able to accept the daily deaths of life, both the great ones and the small, knowing that death is not the end of life but only its passing over to something new in me?

XIII Jesus is taken down from the cross. Am I prepared to let go of everything I ever wanted so that God's will can come another way?

XIV Jesus is laid in the tomb.