Imprints of Heaven
James Cathcart
April 25, 2022
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Listen to this daily worship
Psalm 122 (NRSVA)
1 I was glad when they said to me,
‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’
2 Our feet are standing
within your gates, O Jerusalem.3 Jerusalem—built as a city
that is bound firmly together.
4 To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
as was decreed for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
5 For there the thrones for judgement were set up,
the thrones of the house of David.6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:
‘May they prosper who love you.
7 Peace be within your walls,
and security within your towers.’
8 For the sake of my relatives and friends
I will say, ‘Peace be within you.’
9 For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,
I will seek your good.
We are all imprints of heaven! Humanity is made in the image of God, we are each of us of immeasurable worth and value. When we gather together we are a mosaic, each tile individually beautiful and beautiful as a whole.
Have you heard of a ‘wally close’? It’s a term I first came across in Glasgow to describe the decorated tiles used in the communal stairwells of tenement buildings. In the midst of ordinary journeys, with shopping bags and bikes, prams and umbrellas, doormats and buzzers — are these fantastic tiles, telling stories in shape and colour up and down the storeys and up and down the generations. Wee eyes look up at them from buggies and older eyes look down at them remembering when they first came here with a loved one.
Imagine churches being like that. Places of going up and down, with all of life coming and going, with a common thread of stories catching the light as people leave and return, meet and disperse, laugh and cry, move in and move on. Sometimes staying the same, sometimes changing.
PRAYER:
Spirit of Truth,
When we gather together
Leaning on the bannisters
May we be a chain of tiles
running up and down the stairways of heavenly grace
telling of your love,
in the name of Jesus Christ,
Amen.
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