Seasons of Grace. Ann Lewin
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to many people who have contributed to the production of this book.
Gary Philbrick read the text in preparation, and made many helpful suggestions from a potential user’s point of view. In addition, he has come to my rescue on several occasions when my computer has tried to get the upper hand.
I am grateful to Canterbury Press for undertaking to publish this new, enlarged, edition of Words by the Way, and I remain grateful to the staff at the Inspire imprint of the Methodist Publishing House, now discontinued, for publishing the first edition.
Foreword
It is important for Christians to make connections between our experience of church worship and our ongoing prayer and spiritual life. Seasons of Grace gives us a good opportunity to do this. Taking us through the cycle of the Church’s year, Ann Lewin offers us both a resource for personal reflection (with encouragement about how we might approach our everyday praying) and an imaginative range of liturgical material that picks up the themes and imagery of each season in turn.
The shape of the Church’s year reminds us of the great drama of our creation and salvation, and every time and season contains an invitation to place our own story, and that of our world, within the unfolding story found in Scripture. Yet we can sometimes be so busy or preoccupied that the richness and flavour of the different parts of the Christian year simply pass us by, and we miss the spiritual treasures within the fabric of each particular season. Ann’s book may help us to recover some of these things, such as the wonderful sense of anticipation in Advent, the beauty and mystery of Epiphany, the prayerful possibilities of Good Friday, and the significance of lesser known festivals such as Lammastide.
In her introduction Ann says that she hopes her material ‘will spark off creativity in people looking for fresh ways to present truths about God and ourselves’. I can envisage several ways in which this could happen. Some readers who feel that their prayer life is in a rut may find that this book opens up new ways of relating to God through the year. The practical suggestions on pages 18–19 would be a good place to start for those who are not sure where to go next in their prayer life. In addition, I am sure that people responsible for leading worship, or events such as Quiet Days, will welcome the liturgical material and suggestions. This book might also inspire a group within a congregation to organize a special event for carers (pp. 199ff), the setting up of a Quiet Garden (pp. 202ff), or a day exploring the teaching of someone like Julian of Norwich (pp. 192ff). Ann’s ideas may also encourage readers to take other creative initiatives of their own, using the sort of outlines and practical suggestions that she gives.
This book is earthed in the realities of daily life, and its journey through the seasons frequently connects us with ordinary experiences. At the same time, there are many glimpses of heaven, for example in the section for Easter Eve:
Lord Christ, set us on fire,
burn from us all that dims your light;
kindle an answering flame in lives around,
that darkness may be driven back,
and glory stream into this world,
transforming it with light. (p. 134)
Ann has the knack of offering us lots of ideas without trying to control or dictate what we do. That is probably because of her own deep understanding of what prayer is about:
Prayer is like watching for the
Kingfisher. All you can do is
Be where he is likely to appear and
Wait. (p. 27)
Prayer and worship are about waiting on God with open and generous hearts, rather than trying to control God or make things happen to suit ourselves. One way in which we can grow in this openness to God is when our corporate worship and our personal prayer flow into each other and nourish each other. By using this book we may find that dream becoming more of a reality.
Angela Ashwin
Writer and lecturer on spirituality
Introduction
This book is a collection of material I have devised and used over several years. It contains reflections on the significance of seasons and festivals, as well as schemes for use in Workshops, Quiet Days, Retreats and Courses. There are suggestions for liturgy also, including some Eucharistic Prayers, and a simple order for the Eucharist in which these prayers can be used. The prayers were originally written for specific groups, but they have been adapted for other use also. My aim is always to use as few words as possible to say what needs to be said, and to leave space for people to respond to God as God moves them.
The first two sections of the book reflect the events of Jesus’ life as the Church’s year unfolds. The third section is more diverse, offering responses to the opportunities daily life affords to meet God.
Much of what I offer draws from my own writing in Watching for the Kingfisher, published in an enlarged edition by Canterbury Press in 2009. This edition combines some new work with poems previously published in Candles and Kingfishers and Flashes of Brightness published by the Methodist Publishing House.
I hope that what I offer here will spark off creativity in people looking for fresh ways to present truths about God and ourselves as we explore the riches of God’s love anew, year by year.
Ann Lewin
May 2011
Section 1. Advent to Candlemas
Advent
There’s little doubt about what most of us will be doing in the next four weeks – the Christmas rush to get everything organized, cards written, gifts bought and sent, the preparation of food, plans about whose turn it is to go visiting, and anxieties about who’ll be offended if we don’t pay them enough attention . . . The rush is on, and it’s not surprising that there’s often a hint of panic in people’s conversations – ‘I’ll never be ready!’
In four weeks it’ll all be over, in five a new year will have brought us another set of resolutions, in six the decorations will have come down, the furniture of life will be back in place, and we’ll be back to – what? Will life be just the same, or will we be changed? If we take Advent seriously, I hope we will be changed, because we shall have had the opportunity to reflect again on what it means to say that God came into the world in the humility of the birth at Bethlehem, and that he still comes into the world in all its mess and pain and joy, longing for us to recognize him.
Advent is a godsend, a gift which stops us in our tracks, and makes us realize that we hold dual citizenship (of this world and the kingdom) in awkward tension. We are part of the scene – Christians sometimes appear to be rather superior about what we call commercialization, and say that the real Christmas isn’t about that. But the real Christmas is about precisely that: it’s about God coming into the real world, not to a sanitized stable as we portray it in carols and on Christmas cards, but to a world that needed, and still needs, mucking out. Advent reminds us that the kingdom has other themes to add to the celebration, themes that are there in the Scripture readings for the season: Repent, be ready, keep awake, he comes.
Advent reminds us that not only do we live in two worlds, the one that appears to be going mad all around us, and the one that lives by the kingdom of God’s values, but that we operate in two different time scales, in chronological time, and beyond it. And the point of intersection is now. Passages of Scripture read during Advent, and the Prayer Book collect for Advent which is often used, remind us that now is the time when we have to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armour of light. Now is when we meet God, because we have no other time.
At whatever level we operate, it’s a time for preparation. And whatever else we have to do, there are only so many praying days to Christmas. It is prayer that gives us the opportunity to focus