A Liturgy for Domestic Days

by Douglas McKelvey, excerpt:

Many are the things that must be daily done.
Meet me therefore, O Lord,
in the doing of the small, repetitive tasks.

In the cleaning and ordering and

maintenance and stewardship of things—

   of dishes, of floors, of carpets

   and toilets and tubs,

   of scrubbing and sweeping

   and dusting and laundering—

That by such stewardship I might bring

a greater order to my own life,

and to the lives of any I am given to serve,

so that in those ordered spaces 

bright things might flourish:

fellowship and companionship,

creativity and conversation,

learning and laughter

and enjoyment and health.

As I steward the small, daily tasks,

may I remember these good ends,

and so discover in my labors

the promise of the eternal hopes that underlie them. …

And so I offer this small service to you, O Lord,

for you make no distinction between

   those acts that bring a person

   the wide praise of their peers

and those unmarked acts

   that are accomplished in a quiet obedience

   without accolade.

You see instead the heart, the love,

and the faithful stewardship

of all labors, great and small. …

O God, grant that my heart

might be ordered aright,

knowing that all good service

faithfully rendered

is first a service rendered unto you.

Receive then this my service,

that even in the midst of labors that

hold no happiness in themselves,

I might have increasing joy.

Amen.