Sugar and Spice

Prayer Pairs #13

Today is the last week in our Prayer Pairs series. From next week we start a new series on making your own experiential prayer kit for use at home or for use in your groups such as churches. We’ll include all my favourite items to have on hand for experiential prayer.

But first… let’s think about sugar and spice.

It’s hard for us to imagine today, but once the price of spice was equivalent to the price of gold and silver. The ancient spice trade moved spices around the world, and a small amount of spice was very precious to own and was used with great care. Often spices were saved for use during special festivals and occasions.

Sugar and spice combines two very different commodities to make a new taste. Cinnamon is the often paired with sugar, leading us to think of cinnamon being sweet like sugar. Yet cinnamon on it’s own is woody, citrusy and warm. The combination of sugar and cinnamon in the old days when the words were joined together indicates something is sweet and precious.

Mix four liters of olive oil with the following costly spices: six kilograms of myrrh, three kilograms of cinnamon, three kilograms of cane, and six kilograms of cassia. Measure these according to the official standards. Then use this sacred mixture for dedicating the tent and chest, the table with its equipment, the lampstand with its equipment, the incense altar with all its utensils, the altar for sacrifices, and the large bowl with its stand. By dedicating them in this way, you will make them so holy that anyone who even touches them will become holy.

Exodus 30:23-29 (CEV)

Our prayers this week use cinnamon and sugar. If you’ve been around a few years you might recognise some of these from previous Virtual Prayer Rooms. If so, I’ve thrown in one new prayer just for you!

This week I’ve also launched our upcoming Advent series called Counting Down to Christmas. This year’s theme is A Pinch of Spice and you can read more about it on the Kereru Publishing website or sign up as a free subscriber to our Substack for Counting Down to Christmas where I’ll be sharing more about the writing and inspiration over the next few weeks. The actual daily countdown emails are a paid resource starting on 26th November 2022 and ofinishing on 26th December 2022. I’m very excited and have been waiting to share the news of this year’s theme. My head is full of facts and thoughts and inspiration about spices. If you’ve never joined me for Counting Down to Christmas before I’d love to have you journey with us this year.

May this week’s offering bring you something comforting and yet refreshing.

On the journey

Caroline