Prayer for the Week February 20, 2015

With pipes frozen and more snow on the way, here is a reminder from the poet Lynn Ungar. We used this as the benediction for our online Ash Wednesday service. May it be a blessing and reminder as the snow falls.

SALVATION
By what are you saved? And how?
Saved like a bit of string,
tucked away in a drawer?
Saved like a child rushed from
a burning building, already
singed and coughing smoke?
Or are you salvaged
like a car part—the one good door
when the rest is wrecked?

Do you believe me when I say
you are neither salvaged nor saved,
but salved, anointed by gentle hands
where you are most tender?
Haven’t you seen
the way snow curls down
like a fresh sheet, how it
covers everything,
makes everything
beautiful, without exception?