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Hymns for Lent and Holy Week (Year A)

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Presbyterian hymn writer, Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, composed Lenten hymns based on the lectionary Scriptures set to the tunes of well-loved hymns. Individual hymns are $10. Your hymn purchase includes downloads of  a PDF of the lyrics scored with the music for a half-page regular sheet of paper, a second PDF of the lyrics scored with music for a half-page of legal-sized paper (large print) and a document with lyrics only. You have permission to print as many copies as needed for your use. Lenten hymns — package 1 See! Now is the Time! (Ash Wednesday) One Person’s Sin Changed Every Life Nicodemus Sought Out Jesus The Water God Gives Us A Man Who Could Not See You, O Christ, are Resurrection Lord, What a Parade! (Palm Sunday) On the Night He Was Arrested (Maundy Thursday) Surely He Has Borne Our Suffering (Good Friday) We are His Witnesses (Easter Sunday)  Purchase package 1 for $100 Lenten hymns — package 2 When Giving Your Gifts (Ash … [Read more...]

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Lenten devotions — Year A (2020)

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Are you looking for theologically sound, inspiring and affordable Lenten devotions for the congregation? 5 weeks of Lenten devotions plus bonus prayers for Holy Week — $19.99 Letting go and holding on The liturgical season of Lent invites us to refocus on God as we prayerfully examine our priorities, actions, thoughts and expectations. Often, we give something up for Lent as a way of reminding us daily of Jesus’ sacrifice. We might also take on additional spiritual practices or acts of service so as to follow Jesus more closely. These devotions invite you to both let go and hold on. Each week offers you the opportunity to let go of that which distracts from discerning God’s presence and instead hold on to that which God promises. Week 1 asks us to let go of that which separates us and hold on to communion with God and others, trusting God’s promise to never leave us. Week 2 calls us to set aside empty words and hold on to God’s wisdom, knowing that God promises to give … [Read more...]

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Take Me

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Take my fervor, take my will. Make me silent, yielded, still; wounded, if these wounds may be windows to eternity. Take my talent. What’s it worth? Nothing, save Your humble birth lights the chamber of my heart, truth and meaning to impart. Take my ego. Take my pride. Let docility abide in the soul of who I am, kneeling by my brother Lamb. Take my intellect and find faith and trust and peace of mind, making me content to see mercy as a mystery. Take my dwelling. Take my land, offered to an Unseen Hand that will give them back to me, anchored in eternity. Take my future. Take my past. Both lie in the shadow cast by a rugged cross of wood raised on Friday, known as Good. Take my living. Take my death. Let the Spirit breathe Its breath into this dark lung of me, lit by Your nativity. DANIEL POTTS is a ruling elder at First Presbyterian Church in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.  He started writing poetry after his father began creating visual art in the … [Read more...]

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Wholeness & faith — Jan. 13, 2020

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How do we maintain health and wellness? What makes for good relationships? Where do we find purpose throughout the span of our lives? This issue of the Outlook invites you to delve into these questions and consider how our faith impacts our well-being and the lives of others. Click here to read the issue in the Uberflip reader. Presbyterian churches promise to help families experiencing homelessness Family Promise partners with churches across the country to help low-income families and families experiencing homelessness. Healthy Pastors, Healthy Congregations This Board of Pensions program combines financial education with pastor grants. The difference between triangles and triangulation David Lee Jones offers family systems theory for church leaders. … [Read more...]

Preaching from the Old Testament

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Walter Brueggemann Fortress Press, 196 pages Reviewed by Paul Rowland Jr. “Have you ever seen workers in the street lift off a manhole cover?” asked a gifted preacher friend. They move around the cover with a prying tool, searching for a point of purchase that will enable them to lift the cover, and that, my friend said, “is what I do each week in writing a sermon.” The manhole he tries to access each week, as with many pastors, is frequently from the Gospels and rarely from the Old Testament. Like their congregants, many preachers find “Old” off-putting and “New” attractive. Some complain that they find the Old Testament “so judgmental” though, as Working Preacher’s Presbyterian contributor, Matt Skinner, has often pointed out: Anyone who doesn’t believe the New Testament doesn’t include judgment or that the Old Testament doesn’t include grace, hasn’t read either closely enough. Though the lectionary suggests both a psalm and another Old Testament text each Sunday, many … [Read more...]

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Mirror of our truth

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As I get older, I spend more time in front of the mirror each morning. The issue isn’t vanity — at least that’s not my primary concern. The time in the mirror is less about curating my image for the world. It’s reflection, introspection, meditation, correction, inspiration and motivation. In the mirror, I see myself and who I want to be and am called to be in the world. Mirrors have a funny way of showing us who we are, who we can be and who we are called to be. For 200 years, the Presbyterian Outlook and her predecessors have mirrored who we are as Presbyterians and who we aspire to be as a church. The view has been inspirational and aspirational. And unsurprisingly, it has also been disturbing and frustrating. While not always ideal, the publications mirrored our truth. In the 1930s, the Presbyterian of the South, one of the progenitors, espoused “The Spirituality of the Church.” It was a longstanding doctrine within the Presbyterian Church from the late 19th century. It … [Read more...]

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