As we reflect during this Season of Lent, we are offered many examples of ministering to those we know and those we do not know. In the ancient world, of course, caring for others was direct and hands on. In our modern world, we can reflect the call of Jesus with a touch of a donate button as well as working in a food pantry.
There are some who feel a call to ordained ministry as well as lay discipleship, but the actions that any of us take really constitute a ministry, reflecting the words and actions of the One we follow. Every week, a group of people stand outside Delaney Hall, the privately run immigration detention center in Newark, and hold prayer services, both a witness to an inhumane immigration policy and ministry for detainees and their families.
There are other forms of ministry as well, such as knitting prayer shawls or hats and scarves for those who do not have the money to buy such items to keep warm in the winter, caring for the sick and hungry. Today as our church will join to celebrate the ordination of one feels this call, and in that celebration, we all remember the ministry of Jesus who showed us how to care for others.
Prayer for the Day
God who appears to us in the most unusual places,
Come, so we can see your face and feel your spirit;
God who continually surprises us with your love,
Open us to your presence in those we encounter.
Be with us as we make difficult decisions in our lives
And accompany us as we seek to witness to your peace.
In the name of him who understood that peace requires justice,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
I see everything I do as an extension of the ministry. It’s all about service
Clementa C Pinckney, murdered at Bible study (1973-2015)
With Jesus there are no countries to be conquered, no ideologies to be imposed, no people to be dominated. There are only children, women and men to be loved.
Henri Nouwen, theologian, writer (1932-1996)
What good is it my brothers and sisters if yu say you have faith but not works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace and eat your fill,” and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.
Letter of James 2: 14-17