Praying the Psalms Together this September

For me, it’s in the morning – after my walk, after breakfast, and the sun isn’t fully risen. The world around is still fairly quiet, and my day, with its encounters and calls, demands and distractions and delights, the stuff of life and ministry and community, has yet to fully consume my thoughts.

I find a quiet place and pray.

¹O Lord, I am not proud, I have no haughty looks;
I do not occupy myself with things too great and too hard for me.
²But I still my soul and make it quiet, like a child with its mother;
my soul is quieted within me.
³O Israel, hope in the Lord 
from this time on and forevermore. (Psalm 131)

I want to talk about is the importance of your rhythm of prayer, making space for time each day to read and meditate on the Word of God and to pray for the world, our community, those whose lives touch yours.

In the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion, one way we express our unity is by praying together the Daily Office (for which there are prayer services, including appointed Scripture passages and Psalms, for Morning, Noonday, Evening, and Close of Day).

Bookmark this page now so you can easily find the Daily Office (and the Psalms, Scriptures, and prayers for each day) in the rhythm that works for your life. https://dailyoffice.wordpress.com/

When we pray these psalms together, even if we’re not in the same geographic location or praying at the same time, we are TOGETHER by the power of Christ’s Spirit who is the one uniting and building up the Body of Jesus Christ in every place and time.

³¹You send forth your Spirit, O Lord,
and all your works, all your children, are created;
and so you renew the face of the earth. (Psalm 104:31)

I want to invite you to make a quiet place, a quiet time in your day, and join me in daily prayer and reflection, beginning with the psalms appointed for morning prayer this month. (You can go further and pray the whole daily office prayers, depending on your time and energy levels!)

I’ll be posting a short reflection on a verse from one of the psalms of the day on our church’s Instagram and facebook pages, and I’d love it if you share how God is catching your attention or guiding you through these Scriptures and prayers.

While for me, it’s early morning hours that I set aside to pray like this, I know for others it might be lunch break, or in the evening after work and school and you can finally stop and meditate, letting everything else go. That’s cool. God is present always and everywhere and desiring time with us even as we long for time with God.

¹As a deer longs for the water brooks,
So longs my soul for you, O God.
²My soul is athirst for God, thirsting for the living God;
When shall I come to appear before the presence of God? (Psalm 42:1-2

Maybe find a quiet place alone, on the cool tile of your bathroom floor. Maybe you find it as a household, around the table with a little candle lit in the center. Or on your back stoop, in the shade of a tree whose Latin name you may or may not know, but you do know its yearly cycles of budding leafing flowering senescence winter-waiting. No matter the where or the when, what’s important is that each of us is dedicating a time apart to be with God and with each other in the Spirit.

¹¹“Be still, then, and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:11)

We may not be praying at the same time or in the same place, but by allowing the same psalms to fill our tongues and the same Scriptures to be our focus, we are putting God at our center and allowing Christ and his Spirit to fill us and inspire our living.

Will you join me in prayer this September?