God.
We need a blessing,
Spoken right to us, using our name.
“My son, my daughter, I’ve called you by name. You are mine.”
Because we need to belong to someone.
Irrevocably. Irretrievably.
We think we want, we’ve been told we want,
the blessing of stuff.
We tell each other that your blessing is health,
that it is bills paid, that it is the relief of problems.
But we confess that, when we think carefully,
sometimes we are blessed in the absence of stuff and
are cursed in the absence of challenge.
We confess that we value the release we want you to give us
more than the Spirit that you want to give us.
But we want your Spirit, the seal of your presence, the blessing of you naming us.
We want to be drenched in the waters of baptism, symbolically washed clean.
Remind us today of your power and love and presence, three-person God.
Amen