These Reflective Prayers are the result of permitting a gentle reading of the lectionary texts for a given service to resonate in me and emerge as a searching engagement of the word with my spirit in a mood of settled joy. The ninety samples given are the most recent, in order, at the time of publication.

Prayers for Reflection offers an abundant selection of over 250 prayers from some of our best-loved authors. Bringing together words of warmth and contemplation across a variety of subjects and situations, this helpful collection provides a wealth of resources for both personal and group prayer.

Poetry writing has proven proficient at helping me see what is there to be seen. I will see or hear or reflect on something which then provides an image, a nuance that emerges in a word, a line. The single line and image, written, provides a cadence, a focus of sound and echo that invites a second line, and more. Usually, they come quickly and run until they tell me they are done and the poem is complete. This book draws upon such poems over a pair of sweeps of my history plus a sampling of more current poems that strike me as desirable in this collection. These pieces of my past often recollect for me the occasion but also leave that occasion obscured and allow the poem to do its work of creating an image and a flow in my own mind. The poems, in my experience, write their meaning on my mind. And, I hope, on yours as well. For then the poems do their work.

These Reflective Prayers are the result of permitting a gentle reading of the lectionary texts for a given service to resonate in me and emerge as a searching engagement of the word with my spirit in a mood of settled joy. The ninety samples given are the most recent, in order, at the time of publication.

In the free church tradition, the pastoral prayer has long assumed an important place in the worship of the congregation. It is expected that the pastor will have a more or less extended prayer pertinent to the day and/or to the run of the service in general. Under the circumstances of normal practice, these would involve awareness of a congregation, or a "flock" for a pastor to tend. After ending a normal pastorate and entering retirement and the far more occasional happenstance of entering a pulpit as a guest, the regular preparation for a worship-leading practice became desirable, personally. As a part of that preparation, most often without entering the leadership of worship, least of all as pastor, the pastoral prayer was prepared. This book collects eleven years worth of pastoral prayers, linked to the preaching text of the day by way of the sermon prepared. As there is no flock as reference point, these are, indeed, "Without A Flock".

My poems sharpen my sight, so that I see better what is there to be seen. I will find some situation or image or nuance that catches my eye, intrigues me. Sometimes, that seeing lends itself as an image for me, and then a line, just one at first that, when written down, enters into a cadence, a rhythm, a sense of sound and echo that emerges into a sequence of lines that flow, usually quickly. And then, the lines stop, the images seem complete, and then they announce to me that the poem is complete. That is true whether the image is a raindrop, a face, a pose, a tree, a flower, a bird, a shadow, or the innuendo of faith or country - whatever. This book draws upon poems written some years ago, mostly in the years 2009 and 2015. There are also a few current poems that insist themselves into the collection as they are accumulated into the current year's file. As I revisit poems of years ago, quite often the occasion presents itself to memory - but not always so. Sometimes, that occasion is as if unnecessary and, indeed, almost in the way of the poem as it has come to be. Revisiting is always a pleasure; it becomes one of the spurs toward forming the collection itself. Indeed, it is the pleasure and the satisfaction in that book that brings it about. Satisfaction is such a boon to life.

These meditations take a verse from one of the lectionary texts not chosen for preaching for a given service and offer a devotional reflection on the verse, often using the context of the entire pericope as described in the lectionary. I try to make them worth the while of my readers, finding a fairly broad readership among the congregations I served through the years. The Cross on the cover was made by William Herbert Durst in his Florence workshop. Mr. Durst was the grandfather of Mary-Bess Halford-Staffel who calls it his “Trinity Cross”.

This is the last book in the series of Inn-by-the-Bye stories. It includes not only the final stories of the sequence but also a Prequel in that a related and prior set of stories, which had a different and unfulfilled purpose, provided groundwork for the eventual series itself. The Prequel stories are publicly available now for the first time at any scale. Among the principal stories, I found that these wee folk, the characters I developed and the way they evolved in my mind and on the page, served me well as a consideration of how I sensed things happening in the scriptural text at hand. I am glad to have the entire sweep of the project available now. The cover drawing is done by Eve Sullivan, the author’s granddaughter. The drawing is the artist’s conception of Anna, a young girl living in the Crossed Hills.

My poems help me see what is in front of me. They typically find that an image is presented, an image that seems to suggest a line of verse, just one which, when written down, enters into a cadence, a rhythm, a sense of sound and echo that evolves into a sequence of lines that flow. They flow until they stop, that is, and announce to me that the poem is, in facet, done. That is true whether the image is a raindrop or a tree, a flower or a bird, a shadow or the innuendo of faith or country: whatever. This book draws upon poems written some years ago, mostly in the years 2009 and 2015. There are also a few current poems that insist themselves into the collection as they are accumulated in the current year's file. As I revisit poems of years ago, quite often the occasion presents itself to memory - but not always so. Sometimes that occasion is as if unnecessary and, indeed, almost in the way of the poem as it has come to be. Revisiting is always a pleasure; it becomes one of the spurs toward forming the collection itself. Indeed, it s the pleasure and the satisfaction in the book that brings it about. Satisfaction is such a boon to life.

In an endeavor to find a fresh way into the scriptural text upon which I would be preaching, I began to develop an imaginary world populated primarily by wee folk. I found that they - the characters I developed and the way they evolved in my mind and on the page - served me well as a consideration of how I sensed things happening in the scriptural text at hand. I want to make these stories newly available, and so I bring them to book form, fifty stories at a time. The cover drawing is done by Eve Sullivan, the author's granddaughter. The drawing is the artist's conception of Guerric and Mahara walking along a path in Hyperbia.