For many pastors and Christian leaders, the beginning of summer signals a change of pace (hopefully a slower one!) and time for rest and replenishment. On this, the first day of summer, we bless you and encourage you to receive every good gift of God that summer brings.

Thank you, Lord,
for this season
of sun and slow motion,
of games and porch sitting,
of picnics and light green fireflies
on heavy purple evenings;
and praise for slight breezes.
It’s good, God,
as the first long days of your creation.

Let this season be for me
a time of gathering together the pieces
into which my busyness has broken me.
O God, enable me now
to grow wise through reflection,
peaceful through the song of the cricket,
recreated through the laughter of play.

Most of all, Lord,
let me live easily and grace-fully for a spell,
so that I may see other souls deeply,
share in a silence unhurried,
listen to the sound of sunlight and shadows,
explore barefoot the land of forgotten dreams and shy hopes,
and find the right words to tell another who I am.

Copyright © 1981 Ted Loder, Guerillas of Grace: Prayers for the Battle (Minneapolis: Augsburg Press, 1981), p 131.The Rev. Dr. Ted Loder served as the senior minister of Philadelphia’s First United Methodist Church of Germantown for 38 years, a church known for it’s artistic endeavors, political activism and social justice.

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