"Here I stand; and I say a prayer. Come, Lord, come down, come in, come among us. Enter into our darkness with your light. Come fill our emptiness with your presence. Dispel the clouds and reveal your glory. Come refresh, renew, restore us. Come Lord, come down, come in, come among us."
                    A Celtic Prayer for Advent from the Holy Island of Lindisfarne

I received this prayer in a newsletter this past week. For those who don’t know, Lindisfarne is an island on the northeastern coast of England. It is a rocky, desolate looking place. It would seem an unlikely piece of land to build both a monastery and a castle. Depending on the tides, the water can move in and render any land invisible. There is only towering rock and the shelter for monks and pilgrims perched atop the island. It was the home to both St. Aidan who traveled there from Iona and St. Cuthbert in the late 7th and early part of the 8th centuries.

When I read this prayer, the notion of the God who comes among us became palpable. I imagined those early Christians standing atop that rocky mountain praying this prayer. It might have been an especially important prayer as their vulnerability to Viking invaders became more real. "Come down…come in….come among us." The fervency of the prayer cuts through time.

On Sunday evening as we gathered for a service of prayer and music for peace and an end to war in Iraq, this was our prayer….come down, come in, come among us, God. Though our terrain is not a rocky, isolated monastery jutting out of the ocean, sometimes it sure feels like it. Vulnerable, lonely, frightening, full of despair. "Come fill our emptiness with your presence."

 As we walk through the daily trials of illness, uncertainty, hopelessness, we pray:"Dispel the clouds and reveal your glory." Yesterday I listened as someone asked for just a sign that we are all held by the same God, all united in the same love, even when we construct words and religions to prove the opposite.Yes, just a sign.

As pilgrims along the journey of Advent this is our prayer….come refresh us, come renew us, come restore us……so we may witness to your Emmanuel, God-with-us.

Come Lord, come down, come in, come among us……we pray.