In this Sunday’s readings there is a theme of staying with one you respect and staying where things are amazing. Instead of allowing us to always stay, sometimes God calls us away. Sometimes away is off the mountaintop back to our ordinary lives. Sometimes away means saying good-bye to a mentor or friends or our plans for how things should be. Our prayer for illumination before reading Scriptures is a time for us to open ourselves to where God is calling us and where God might be leading us away from where we’d prefer to be. Let us pray.
Holy One, We make great plans, and you surprise us with different plans. We turn to your Word expecting to hear what we’ve always heard, and you urge us to open our ears to new possibilities. We will try. Speak to us through the words of your Holy Scripture, and we will try to listen as if for the first time. Amen.