Christ Memorial was a church plant of Salem Lutheran in Affton in 1948. Our history is God “sowing seeds” and “bearing fruit.” What will he grow in the next 75 years? Martin Luther once said, “Even if I knew the world would end tomorrow, I would still plant my apple tree today.” We continue to plant seeds for coming generations of gospel multiplication. More people loved in Christ, more people sent into the world.
Invocation
Make the sign of the cross, and say,
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Invitation Prayer
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” (Matt. 5:5) O Lord, I am lowly and humble. You alone are my inheritance. Amen.
Word: Matthew 13:32a
““It is the smallest of all seeds…”
Meditation
Hazelnut by Megan Roegner
One of my personal heroes is an anchoress from the 14th century, Julian of Norwich. Anchorites were medieval religious figures who chose to be enclosed in cells attached to a church for the rest of their lives, participating in Mass and providing wisdom to the community through windows facing into the church and out toward the world. The consecration performed when an anchorite entered their cell was very similar to a funeral rite, as they became, in many ways, dead to the world.
Julian lived in England during a tumultuous time. All eras have their challenges, of course, but by any measure, life in 14th century England could be objectively awful: the plague was rampant, and there was a great deal of social and religious upheaval as a result. We don’t know much about Julian’s life before she entered her cell, but it is very possible that she had been a wife and mother and had lost her family to disease. We don’t even know Julian’s real name, as she assumed the name of her church, St. Julian’s, when she took up the vocation of anchoress.
Remarkably, this mysterious figure is the earliest female attributed author of a book in the English language. Julian wrote about a series of incredible visions she received after a terrible illness in a text now titled Revelations of Divine Love. In one of her visions, Julian saw the world as a hazelnut. She writes,
[God] showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazelnut, lying in the palm of my hand, as it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it with the eye of my understanding, and thought, ‘What may this be?’ And it was answered generally thus, ‘It is all that is made.’ I marveled how it might last, for I thought it might suddenly have fallen to nothing for littleness. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it. And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.
In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that God loves it. And the third, that God keeps it.
In Matthew 13, Jesus talks about how the little mustard seed can grow into a huge plant, and, this, of course, is vital for us to remember—that our small actions can have huge impacts. But Julian’s vision of the hazelnut is a reminder of how small things aren’t just cherished by God because of their potential to one day be bigger. They (we) are made, loved, and kept, even in our “littleness.”
Julian’s Revelations of Divine Love was not well known until the twentieth century, when she attracted the attention of modern writers, like the poet T.S. Eliot, who included the following, now famous, lines of Julian’s in his poem “Little Gidding” :
All shall be well, and
All manner of thing shall be well.
When Julian died in her cell, she had no way of knowing that one day her “showings,” as she called them, would be read and studied around the world. When she died, she was still looking out from her cell at a tumultuous and bleak world, a little, insignificant person. And yet, she was confident that she was beloved by Jesus and that, because of his love, “all shall be well,” not just for her, but for this whole little hazelnut of a world.
Dear Jesus, when we feel small, give us confidence that we are made and loved by you. When we feel vulnerable, help us remember that you will keep us safe, and that all shall be well. Amen.
Prayer for Family
· For my immediate family (parents, spouse, siblings).
· For extended family (cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents)
· For close friends that are as family to me.
· For those who don’t have families, or whose families are broken.
· For forgiveness and reconciliation where there is division in my family.
· For provision where there is need in my family.
· For God to be the foundation, and the cross the center of my family.
· For a generation yet unborn, future members of our family.
Closing Prayer
O Lord and King, your Kingdom comes even without our prayer. But we pray that it would also come among us. We are desperate for your reign and rule, for all we see is rebellion. Come into my heart, my home, my family, my work, my church, my community. Rule with justice and with mercy. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.