Avinu Malkeinu

Today, as we reflect on the pilgrimage through Lent to Easter, through death into new life, we meditate today on the Jewish hymn of repentance and mourning, Avinu Malkeinu:

Today’s music is an ancient Jewish hymn that is sung on communal days of penitence, like Yom Kippur, and on private days of mourning, such as funerals. A song like this hymn would perhaps have been sung at Lazarus’ funeral. The lyrics begin: 

Our Father, our King!

We have sinned before You!
Our Father, Our King
We have no King except You.
Our Father, Our King!
deal with us kindly
Following this address to God, the hymn lists a series of petitions asking for deliverance from pestilence, persecution, and misfortune. The hymn asks God to bring us, his people, back in “wholehearted repentance before You.”
As you pray along with this music, we invite you to pray along with this ancient prayer in the silence of your own heart. What do you need God to deliver you from this Lent? What sorrows or losses in your life are crying out for God’s consolation?