Tag Archive for "joy and faith"

Posts Tagged ‘joy and faith’

Prayer of Joy

Posted on: March 19th, 2017 by Alden

This is a prayer of gratitude for joy, with a reminder to live joy as a daily spiritual practice. It’s a meditation for daily use when time is brief. It’s in my new book This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day from CCAR Press.

Prayer of Joy
G-d,
Thank You for joy and delight,
For wonder and awe,
For moments of gladness and celebration.
Grant me the ability to breathe gentleness
Into my hours and seasons,
So that I live awake to beauty,
To holiness,
To the radiance that surrounds us.
Grant me the wisdom to arrive each day
With passion and humor,
With song and dance,
With smiling eyes,
In service to myself,
In service to others,
In service to Your Holy Name.

Postscript: This piece originally appeared on March 29, 2013, this site as “Quick Prayer of Joy.” It appears in my new book This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day from CCAR Press.

Please check out my Meet the Author video and This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day. For reprint permissions and usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” To receive my latest prayers via email, please subscribe (on the home page). You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Credit: ThyBlackMan.com

Sweet Cake

Posted on: September 27th, 2016 by Alden

For Rosh Hashanah, my secret recipe for sweet cake is this song of the spiritual traveler, an extended metaphor that shimmers with hope and prayer. It’s more of a yearning than a classic prayer, a love poem about life. And yet, aren’t all yearnings simply silent prayers of the heart? “Sweet Cake” appears in This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day.

Sweet Cake
Give me a drop of honey,
And I will give you the harvest moon.
Give me a silent tear,
And I will give you the roaring sea.
Give me a cup of milk,
And I will give you the rising sun.
Give me your secret prayer,
And I will give you my broken heart.

Give me a drop of honey and we will
Make a feast of this life.
Sweet cake,
To feed ourselves with joy and love.
Sweet cake,
To feed the world with awe and wonder.
Sweet cake,
Of milk and honey.
Sweet cake,
Of prayers and tears.

Postscript: One of my favorite pieces that’s written in the voice of the spiritual traveler is called “Come Walk.” Other prayers in the voice of the spiritual traveler include: “All is Well,” “River,” “Bird is Bird,” “Leaving,” “Remember” and “About the Rainbow.” This meditation first appeared on this site on December 12, 2013.

For usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” For notices of new prayers, please subscribe. You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter. If you like this prayer, please post a link to your Facebook page, your blog or mention it in a tweet.

Photo Sources: The Monday Box

The Way of Spices

Posted on: May 15th, 2016 by Alden

Here’s a new song of the spiritual traveler. An extended metaphor, it’s about understanding the nature of each moment and taking those moments into ourselves as gifts.

The Way of Spices
When you reach the way of spices
Fiery and sweet
Cinnamon and ginger, cumin and cardamom
Inhale with all of your senses
Taste this moment
Mixtures familiar and new
Subtle and strong
Salt and pepper
The way of ending and beginning.

When you reach the path of color
Bold and bright
Azure and gold, crimson and amber
Breathe the hues through your chest
See this moment
A palace of refracted light
Sparkling radiant
Brilliant and luminous
The path of beauty and holiness.

When you reach the road of fabric
Coarse and fine
Burlap and silk, flax and silver thread
Remove your gloves and shoes
Feel this moment
The tapestry that weaves and reweaves
Seen and unseen
Stitched and embroidered
The road of being and becoming.

When you reach the canyon of shadow
Dark and steep
Unknown and unseen, shapeless and shifting
Let courage guide your steps
Ascend this moment
A trail of challenge and victory
Power and perseverance
Bravery and honor
The canyon of wisdom and grace.

When you reach the passage to your heart
Delight in the grandeur
Savor the brilliance
And voyage into adventure
Peace will be your companion
And joy will be your guide
Your nights will be bright with starlight
And your days will shimmer with splendor.

Postscript: Other songs of the spiritual traveler include: “Come Walk,” “All is Well,” “River,” “Bird is Bird” and “About the Rainbow.”

Please consider making a contribution to support this site and my writing. For usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” For notices of new prayers, please subscribe. You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Source: WikiMedia Commons

Va’etchanan: Affirmation of Faith

Posted on: July 29th, 2015 by Alden

This week’s Torah portion, Va’etchanan, includes both the 10 Commandments and the bold declaration of our belief in G-d, the sine qua non of Jewish affirmations, the Shema. [Deuteronomy 6:4] This prayer weaves two paragraphs about the love of God – and dedication to mitzvot – into the words of the Shema. This piece appears in This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day from CCAR Press.

Affirmation of Faith

Hear O Israel,

The covenant we made
Together on Sinai
Is a pledge for all time,
A vow for the ages,
To do and to listen
To teach and to learn
With the fullness of our hearts
From the depths of our souls
And the strength of our being
Binding ourselves to

Adonai Our G-d

With Torah and Mitzvot,
Binding our lives to each other
With righteousness and charity,
So that blessings will rain down from heaven
To feed our hearts and fill our land
With G-d’s abundant gifts,
The brilliance and wonder
That flow from service to G-d’s Holy Word,
In remembrance of creation
And our liberation from slavery,
Declaring throughout the generations:

G-d is One,

G-d is One,
G-d is One.

שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ יְהוָה אֶחָֽד׃‎

Postscript: This prayer was originally written for a conversion reaffirmation ceremony, which is discussed in the original post of December 10, 2013. Here’s a link to a meditation called “Doubt,” representing a radically different approach to finding faith.

Please check out my ELItalk video, “Falling in Love with Prayer,” and This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day. For reprint permissions and usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” To receive my latest prayers via email, please subscribe (on the home page). You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Credit: Hebrew TShirts

Balak: Your Dwelling Place

Posted on: June 28th, 2015 by Alden

Ma Tovu is one of my favorite prayers. The opening line comes from this week’s Torah portion, Balak. Balak hires Bil’am to curse the people Israel, but instead he blesses them. The blessing includes this line, which opens Ma Tovu: “How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, thy dwellings, O Israel!” [Numbers 24:5] According to rabbinic interpretation, the ‘tents’ are ‘tents of Torah’ and the ‘dwellings’ are synagogues. This prayer turns the metaphor once again, stating that our lives can be the dwelling place of G-d’s glory when we do the work of love and charity. Two lines from Ma Tovu, traditionally said upon entering a synagogue, frame the second stanza.

Your Dwelling Place
When I pray,
When I quiet my mind and open my heart,
I become a priest/priestess
In the house of God.

G-d,
I love Your house,
Your habitation,
The dwelling place of Your glory.
Let me serve You with my hands,
With the toil of healing the world,
With the labor of kindness and compassion.
And I will become Your abode
Of love and charity,
Of thanksgiving and peace,
Doing Your will in joy,
Rejoicing in Your work.
How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob,
Thy dwellings, O Israel!

Let my life become a temple,
A sanctuary of praise and service,
And You will dwell
In me.

Postscript: Some of my other prayers that borrow quotes directly from the liturgy include: “Come, Beloved,” “Sephardi Quarter Note,” “Gathering: A Dream of Reunion” and “Affirmation of Faith.”

Let G-d

Posted on: May 21st, 2015 by Alden

This simple prayer is a reminder to invite G-d into our lives and to move in the direction of holiness. My other pieces using birds and flight as a metaphor include: “Soarbird,” “Bird is Bird” and “First Bird.”

Let G-d
Let G-d
Hold majesty before your eyes,
And mystery before your heart.

Let G-d
Place strength in your hands
And radiance in your soul.

Let G-d
Lead you to awe and wonder
And redeem you from fear and shame.

You are cloud and horizon,
A bird in solo flight,
Seeking your flock,
Seeking your journey,
Seeking your place.

Let G-d
Put healing in your hours
And rejoicing in all of your days.

Let G-d
Find you in the open sky
And lift you in joy and grace.

Postscript: You might also like “Fresh Delights” and “Unseen Lands.”

Photo Source: Island Real Estate

The Gifts of Our Lives

Posted on: April 4th, 2015 by Alden

This new prayer of gratitude includes an alphabetical acrostic. Acrostics were a mainstay of Jewish liturgical poems, known as piyutim. This piece combines the acrostic with a four-part structure that repeats in each of the internal stanzas, using the metaphor of G-d as “well,” “source,” “foundation” and “crown.” In an early draft of a prayer called Elijah, I spelled his name with the initial letters in each of the opening lines, but later revised the piece to broaden its scope, losing the acrostic.

The Gifts of Our Lives
With gratitude and appreciation
We give thanks for the gifts
Which flow into our lives day-by-day.
A river of divine blessing.

For You are the well of Abundance,
The source of Beauty,
The foundation of Courage
And the crown of Dreams.

You are the well of Energy,
The source of Faith,
The foundation of Grace
And the crown of Hope.

You are the well of Insight,
The source of Justice,
The foundation of Kindness
And the crown of Love

You are the well of Mercy,
The source of Nourishment,
The foundation of Our Lives
And the crown of Peace.

You are the well of Quiet,
The source of Righteousness,
The foundation of Strength
And the crown of Truth.

For You are the well of Understanding,
The source of Vitality,
The foundation of Wonder
And the crown of Years.

With gratitude and appreciation
We give thanks for the gifts
Which flow into our lives day-by-day.
A river of divine blessing.

Postscript: Note that this acrostic is incomplete, it that I did not create lines for the letters ‘q’ and ‘z.’ My other prayers of gratitude include several favorites: “Fresh Delights,” “Now,” “One Gift,” “Unseen Lands” and “Sacred Cargo.”

Photo Source: Heaven Now

Soul Shine

Posted on: February 1st, 2015 by Alden

This meditation is about allowing our souls to fill our hearts, to fill our minds and to fill our bodies with the radiance of heaven, so that we can bring that light into the world as tikun olam, the act of repairing the world. The meditation recognizes the majesty within each of us, declaring that that glory must be shared. This piece appears in This Joyous Soul: A New Voice for Ancient Yearnings from CCAR Press.

Soul Shine
Let your soul shine
In your chest.
Let your heart sparkle
In your eyes.
Let joy
Fill your limbs with radiance.
Let love
Fill your hands with splendor.
You are the instrument
Of G-d’s music,
The tool
Of repairing the earth.
You are the voice
Of wonder and awe,
The song
Of hope and tomorrow.

This gift,
This majesty within,
Is not yours to keep.
It is not yours to hold.
It is not yours to hide.

Let your soul shine
Luminous, elegant,
Brave and true,
A beacon of praise,
A lantern of song,
A summons for holiness
To enter our lives
And this world.

Let your soul shine.
Set it free.
Set it free to fill the space
Between the here
And the unknown
With abundance
And with blessings.

Postscript: If you enjoyed this meditation, you might also like: “Fresh Delights,” “Come Walk,” “Let Me” and “This is the Place.” And for musical accompaniment, here’s a link to the Allman Brothers Band singing “Soulshine.”

Photo Source: tomboyArt on Esty

Fresh Delights

Posted on: February 5th, 2014 by Alden

This is a short meditation about the simple beauty that surrounds us day-by-day. It ends with a reminder that the wonder and the majesty that fills the earth – from the first bird of morning to the awe that surrounds us – “blossom” in praise of G-d’s Holy Name.

Fresh Delights
Life is a garden of fresh delights,
Blossoming with wonders,
Large and small.
The first bird of morning,
The fresh smells of dawn,
And the promise of awe and adventure.

Holy One,
Help me to see, to love and to cherish
This harvest,
This bounty of gifts,
This flow of sights.
Let me feel the rushing river
Pulsing in my veins.

Let me know the sacred sunshine
In my beating heart.
Let me thank you and bless You,
G-d of Old,
For Your steadfast love,
Day by day.

Life is a garden of fresh delights,
Blossoming with praises
For G-d’s Holy Name.

Postscript: If you enjoyed this meditation, you might also like: “First Bird,” “Come Walk,” “All is Well,” “River,” “Bird is Bird” and “Leaving.”

Photo Source: Alden Solovy

Tears

Posted on: January 12th, 2014 by Alden

I spent the morning thinking about tears. Women’s tears. With a backdrop of planning a shiur to commemorate the fifth anniversary of Ami’s z”l death, I learned the story of a friend and the deaths of her three children. Then, remembering the car accident that killed a toddler in South Jerusalem just a few weeks ago, the essay about the end of sheloshim for Superman Sam Sommer z”l played in my mind. I thought about the tears of joy Ami would cry if she could see our daughters now. And the tears of sadness she is surely crying because she is not here with us. This meditation is the result.

The last three lines are an allusion to my respect for the Women of the Wall and all women who pioneer expression of Judaism in their lives and the role of women as leaders, teachers, rabbis and scholars for Klal Yisroel.

Tears
The Mothers of Israel
Pass their tears
From generation to generation:
The grief and the longing,
The hope and surrender,
The breathless yearning,
Gifted mother to daughter
For millennia.

Daughters of Israel,
Your tears are a prayer,
An offering on the altar of our lives,
Rising to the Gates of Righteousness,
Summoning Sarah and Miriam,
Leah and Tamar, Rebecca and Dinah,
Rachel and Channa, Deborah and Penina,
Esther, Ruth and the daughters of Zelophehad,
Matriarchs and prophets, leaders and teachers,
The entire tent of women throughout the ages
To cry out:

Heal us, G-d of old.
Shelter us, G-d of love.
Make us whole.

Sisters of Israel,
You are our light.
You are our heartbeat.
Your sorrows are our plea
Before the Gates of Mercy.
Lead us into prayer.
Lead us from darkness to light.
Lead us in service to G-d’s Holy Name.

Postscript: I am, to a degree, uncomfortable with the gender bias in this piece. Yet something feels true about it: that there’s a special character to women’s tears. My intent is to honor that character without diminishing the importance of men’s tears and emotions. I also wonder if the piece overuses references to the names of Biblical women or if the order of the names is disconcerting, taking the reader out of the prayer. I encourage your comments on these two issues. This meditation is a reflection of an idea I wrote about in piece of flash fiction called “Chava bat Chana.” Here are two more short, story stories about strong and spiritual Jewish women: “Sarah Rivkah: A Challah Baking Story” and “Bracha Simcha.”

Please consider making a contribution to support this site and my writing. For usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” For notices of new prayers, please subscribe. You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter. If you use or like this prayer, please post a link to Facebook, your blog or mention it in a tweet.