Sunday 6 February 2022

Today is Sunday the 6th of February, beginning the fifth week of Ordinary time.
Checko Ankrah and Nicky Lathbridge sing, ‘High and Lifted’.

Today’s reading is from the Prophet Isaiah.
Isaiah 6: 1-8

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said:

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.’ 
The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said: ‘Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!’

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: ‘Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.’ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’

“I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple.” Isaiah writes.
Can you let Isaiah’s awe-inspiring vision carry you to the throne room of the Lord right now?

How is it like to be in this holy place?

Isaiah cries out to the Lord, “Woe to me, for I am unworthy!”
What would you like to cry out to God?

As you listen to the reading again, notice how God meets with Isaiah in his feelings of unworthiness about being there.

The Lord says to Isaiah, “Your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.”
Can you receive these words as if they are for you?

To end your prayer, you may like to join in with the words of the Seraphs who surround the throne, setting your heart on the One who sits on the throne:
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts!”
The whole earth is full of His glory.” Repeat this three times…

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.