Mental Health Sunday 4: Relationships

Posted on October 10, 2020 by davebarnhart

(This is an order of worship for a devotional service based on the format of Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals.)

Before Dietrich Bonhoeffer became a martyr, he helped start an “underground seminary” in1935 at Finkenwalde for the Confessing Church, Lutherans who resisted Nazism. The seminary operated as an intentional community for two years until the Gestapo shut it down in 1937. Bonhoeffer wrote the book Life Together while at Finkenwalde to help shape the community. He wrote, “The prisoner, the sick person, the Christian living in the diaspora recognizes in the nearness of a fellow Christian a physical sign of the gracious presence of the triune God. In their loneliness, both the visitor and the one visited recognize in each other the Christ who is present in the body. They receive and meet each other as one meets the Lord, in reverence, humility, and joy.”

O Lord, let my soul rise up to meet you
as the day rises to meet the sun.
Glory to the Creator, and to the Redeemer, and to the Sustainer,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.
Come, let us bow down and bend the knee; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.

We are fearfully and wonderfully made, O God; All your works are wonderful.

Psalm 139:13-6 (NRSV)
…it was you who formed my inward parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works; that I know very well.
My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed.
How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
I come to the end—I am still with you.

We are fearfully and wonderfully made, O God; All your works are wonderful.

Hebrew Bible Reading: 1 Samuel 18:1-5

Second Hebrew Bible Reading: Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

New Testament Reading: John 17:20-26

We are fearfully and wonderfully made, O God; All your works are wonderful.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote: “Those who love their dream of Christian community more than the Christian community itself become destroyers of that Christian community, even though their personal intentions may be ever so honest, earnest, and sacrificial.”

Prayers for Others
Lord’s Prayer
Message and Discussion

God of Life and Source of Meaning, we and our human communities are fearfully and wonderfully made. Help us see in others and in ourselves the image you have imprinted on us. May our relationships be sources of healing and courage.

May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you, wherever he may send you;
may he guide you through the wilderness, protect you through the storm;
may he bring you home rejoicing, at the wonders he has shown you;
may he bring you home rejoicing, once again into our doors.

Mental Health Sunday 2: Trauma and Healing

Posted on September 27, 2020 by davebarnhart

(This is an order of worship for a devotional service based on the format of Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals.)

Henri Nouwen’s book The Wounded Healer has helped many people understand Christ’s action in their own lives. He wrote: “The greatest complaint of the Spanish mystics St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross was that they lacked a spiritual guide to lead them along the right paths and enable them to distinguish between creative and destructive spirits. We hardly need emphasize how dangerous the experimentation with the interior life can be. Drugs as well as different concentration practices and withdrawal into the self often do more harm than good. On the other hand it also is becoming obvious that those who avoid the painful encounter with the unseen are doomed to live a supercilious, boring and superficial life.”

O Lord, let my soul rise up to meet you
as the day rises to meet the sun.
Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.
Come, let us bow down and bend the knee; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker

Heal the brokenhearted, God, and bandage all their wounds.

Psalm 147

Praise the Lord! Because it is good to sing praise to our God!
Because it is a pleasure to make beautiful praise!
The Lord rebuilds Jerusalem, gathering up Israel’s exiles.
God heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds.
God counts the stars by number, giving each one a name.
Our Lord is great and so strong! God’s knowledge can’t be grasped!
The Lord helps the poor,
but throws the wicked down on the dirt!

Heal the brokenhearted, God, and bandage all their wounds.

Henri Nouwen wrote: “experience tells us that we can only love because we are born out of love, that we can only give because our life is a gift, and that we can only make others free because we are set free by Him whose heart is greater than ours. When we have found the anchor places for our lives in our own center, we can be free to let others enter into the space created for them and allow them to dance their own dance, sing their own song and speak their own language without fear.”

Scripture 1: Genesis 22:9-22
Scripture 2: Revelation 22:1-5

Heal the brokenhearted, God, and bandage all their wounds.

Prayers for Others
Lord’s Prayer
Message and Discussion

Wounded Healer, we neither long for suffering nor reject it entirely. Frequently we manufacture it for ourselves, yet we cannot seem to stop. Help us to embrace our woundedness so that you may heal us through it, and to acknowledge our brokenness in a way that allows us to move beyond it.

May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you, wherever he may send you;
may he guide you through the wilderness, protect you through the storm;
may he bring you home rejoicing, at the wonders he has shown you;
may he bring you home rejoicing, once again into our doors.

Mental Health Sunday 1: Changing our Attitudes Toward Mental Health

Posted on September 19, 2020 by davebarnhart

(This is an order of worship for a devotional service based on the format of Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals.)

Viktor Frankl was a psychiatrist in Vienna who specialized in treating anxiety and depression. Because of his success in radically lowering the suicide rate among high school students, he became head of the suicide prevention department at the General Hospital in Vienna. In 1942 German authorities sent him and his wife, parents, and brother to concentration camps. In the camps, he focused on helping his colleagues overcome their despair. When the camps were liberated, he learned that all of his immediate family were dead, except his sister who had fled the country. Reflecting on his own experiences and dealing with his own trauma, Frankl wrote the book Man’s Search for Meaning, developed a form of therapy called logotherapy, and began what came to be known as existential therapy. He spent the rest of his life making the case that humans are not primarily motivate by sex or power, but by meaning. He helped the field of mental health studies take love and spirituality seriously.

O Lord, let my soul rise up to meet you
as the day rises to meet the sun.
Glory to the Creator, and to the Redeemer, and to the Sustainer,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.

Come, let us bow down and bend the knee; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.

Help us to seek and know you, God, so that we may also know ourselves.

Psalm 139:1-6 (CEB)
Lord, you have examined me. You know me.
You know when I sit down and when I stand up.
Even from far away, you comprehend my plans.
You study my traveling and resting.
You are thoroughly familiar with all my ways.
There isn’t a word on my tongue, Lord, that you don’t already know completely.
You surround me—front and back.
You put your hand on me.
That kind of knowledge is too much for me;
it’s so high above me that I can’t reach it.

Help us to seek and know you, God, so that we may also know ourselves.

Hebrew Bible Reading: 1 Samuel 16:14-23

New Testament Reading: Philippians 4:2-13

Help us to seek and know you, God, so that we may also know ourselves.

Viktor Frankl said: “For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it.”

Prayers for Others
Lord’s Prayer

God of Life and Source of Meaning, in both the peace and the storm of life, you are there. Place within us a peace that passes understanding, so that we find meaning and strength to do what needs to be done. Turn our minds to your goodness, so that in all circumstances we may find purpose and hope.