Author: Ken Sehested

“Beloved” is where we begin the journey through Lent – Part 2

Ken Sehested

The original blessing of God’s delight in Creation echoes through this blessing given by Isaac to his son: "May God give you of the dew of heaven and of the fatness of the earth, and plenty of grain and wine" (Genesis 27:28). Such luscious, material bounty is bound up with and parallels the maintenance of covenant faithfulness with the Heaven’s insistence.

But a fraud is perpetuated by Jacob (suggested by his mother and Isaac’s wife, Rebekah), who disguised himself as his brother Esau, Isaac’s first-born.

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Hints on how Lent’s labor can be carried out

Including 35 questions for contemplative attention

Ken Sehested

Invocation. “Tempted and tried we're oft made to wonder why it should be thus all the day long / While there are others living about us, never molested, though in the wrong. . . . / Farther along we'll know all about it; farther along we'll understand why / Cheer up, my brother; live in the sunshine, we'll understand it all by and by.” —“Farther Along,” Dolly Parton

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Ashen interposition

Ash Wednesday call to worship

Ken Sehested

Dearly beloveds,
the ashen interposition stakes its claim upon us
in this midweek assembly, and
the Word is announced by trumpet’s blast
rather than a piccolo’s peep.
We approach the hour of trembling.

But the Beloved One – who nestled with us
even in our gestation—this One has a
reprimand to announce.
In the midst of our modern conveniences –
in our sheltered presumptions,
our decent good order,
our fashioned attire, and our
tamed and housebroken piety –
we have all but lost the capacity for trembling.

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Calls to worship-Advent 2024

Ken Sehested

In Memory of Rosa Parks’ refusal to relinquish her bus seat, leading to her arrest,
1 December 1955, Montgomery, Alabama, a small act of defiance which
prompted the modern Civil Rights movement.

 

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Commentary on Advent’s Joy Sunday

(or any time joy is highlighted by the day’s lection)

Ken Sehested

Processional. “Ode to Joy” (“Ode an die Freude”). —from Ludwig van Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, flashmob performance, orchestra and choir, in a Sabadell, Spain public plaza

Invocation. “Among the tales of sorrow and of ruin that come down to us from the darkness of these days there are yet some in which amid weeping there is joy and under the shadow of death light that endures.” —J.R.R. Tolkien

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Do not fear grief

Ken Sehested

Every lit and lively season (Christmas, especially) comes, for some, with heartache, usually over the absence of a beloved whose remembrance still cuts to the quick and pickles the heart. In addition, Nativity’s season unfolded with ancient Palestine’s writhing under the oppressive heel of Rome’s imperial boot. The poem below is set in these parallel moods.

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New Year’s resolutions – 3.5 recommendations

Ken Sehested

Processional. “Who then shall stir in this darkness, / prepare for joy in the winter night. / Mortal in darkness we lie down blindhearted, / seeing no light. / Lord, give us grace to awake us, / to see the branch that begins to bloom; / in great humility is hid all heaven / in a little room.” —“What Is the Crying at Jordan,” The Miserable Offenders

Invocation. “Let us consider how to incite one another to love and good works . . . encouraging one another. . . .” —Hebrews 10:24-25

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Pastoral empathy and prophetic discord

Against the backdrop of the war in Gaza

Ken Sehested

“For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you shall
burst into song, the trees in applause.”
—Isaiah 55:12

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