Bonus: Story - Zaccheus and Jesus

Each week, on a Wednesday, I post a 'Midweek Musing' over on my other blog, sarah tells stories. Today, it's a story for the lectionary reading from the Gospels this Sunday.

'Zaccheus' by Joel Whitehead
source: The Text this Week

Jesus enters Jericho and is passing through the town. He is not alone. His followers are with him – the twelve, the women, the followers travelling for various reasons and lengths of time. And the crowd. There is always a crowd.

As followers move on, or the support team of women go ahead to find food and lodging for the intimate group, words gets out. The word is out; wild, untamable, contagious and gathering mass and momentum.

The word is out! He heals! I am well again! She can see again! They – they ­– were made welcome! The word is out: the word is, he is, here! And the people spill out from their homes and farms, from the market places, shops and gardens. He is here, and all desire an encounter, to be closer, to see!


Zaccheus is in Jericho, a senior tax collector there, and very rich. Zaccheus wants to see who this Jesus is, who could be gathering such crowds, who is liked and loved by all; who is so many things that he, Zaccheus, is not. ... 

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Patrons received this story earlier than this public release, as their bonus in the collected Pray the Story poem-prayers for November.

A bonus, you say?

All the poems for a whole month in advance, you say?

Yes, I do say!

And you, too can enjoy such bonuses and early reading of the prayer-poems when you become a patron of sarah tells stories – from as little as $1 per month! The Pray the Story collection and bonus is for every patron.

Becoming a patron is a way of supporting the creative work of artists who are working on small and/or ongoing projects. Join for as long as is right for you, at the amount that is right for you.

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Story, Poetry and Prayer: a new venture for a growing endeavour

Welcome to Pray the Story – prayer-poems inspired by Biblical stories on the weekly lectionary.*

I am a storyteller, poet and minister (Uniting Church in Australia), from Adelaide in Australia. For now, I am living in Edinburgh, Scotland, the land of my ancestors, to further develop this vocation of storyteller/poet/minister; first, through PhD studies into the Biblical story and oral performance, and second by working as a freelance performer, writer, educator and presider of sacred spaces.

This blog is a new venture within that work.

As a storyteller/poet/minister, I believe what is mine to do in my community is to help us to know our story and live it with integrity and courage. By our story, I mean the Sacred Story, or Bible, which the Christian community receives from our spiritual ancestors; I also mean our personal stories as individuals and communities of faith (or congregations), and if you click through to sarah tells stories, you can find out how I do that through workshops, publications, and the (in)humanity series of stories of human fear and love.


In this 'Pray the Story' space, I hope to bring together all three elements of my vocation to offer prayer-poems that respond to the biblical stories, and invite us to know our story well through prayer and reflection.

As a way of beginning, each Sunday, I will post a prayer-poem for one of the stories that will appear on the lectionary for the coming week. Perhaps in time I will be able to offer prayers for two or more of the weekly stories.

There is no obligation to pay for these prayer-poems, I offer them to the Christian community. However, if you would like to, and are able to, support 'Pray the Story', and the broader work of sarah tells stories, please consider becoming a patron.** A bonus for patrons is that you receive a whole month of prayer-poems in advance of their weekly posting on Pray the Story. The first advance collection is for the month of June, and will be posted for patrons on 15 May.

Pray the Story will begin with weekly blog posts from this coming Sunday, 8 May.

Please feel free to use these prayer-poems in your communities, I hope they will enrich your encounters with the Sacred Story, and with the Sacred.

Sarah.


* The lectionary – Revised Common Lectionary – is a three year cycle of short passages from Old Testament, Psalm, Letters and Gospels designed to help the Christian community to engage with the breadth of the Sacred Story over time.

** Patronage for sarah tells stories is managed by Patreon, an enterprise established to facilitate financial support of artists working on smaller and ongoing projects, rather than the big projects for which go fund me or kickstarter exist. For each level of support, patrons can choose to receive a variety of rewards. With your support, I will continue to compose, perform and facilitate poems and stories and spaces to encourage the health of our shared humanity.