NOVEMBER IS NATIVE AMERICAN HERITAGE MONTH

This is a handout that you can use anytime this month. Again, reformat the document into two columns so you can get two copies from one page of paper.

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NOVEMBER IS

NATIVE AMERICAN HERITAGE MONTH

The following prayer is from a service of Communion created by Discipleship Ministries, UMC.

We send to you, Creator God, our dreams, visions, and prayers.

For our mission,
Let your Spirit move us to honor and respect one another – from the least to the greatest. May we treat everyone we encounter with dignity and love. May we affirm the image of the Creator within each one of us. May we help restore the image of the Creator on earth. May our words, thoughts, and actions nourish and sustain your creation.

For the Church,
May she lead and dance with honor. Let all who follow her steps and rhythm know and feel righteousness and strength. May her regalia exemplify purity and perfection.

For the world:
May the nations of the earth gather to listen to the heartbeat of God. May they sit in silence as the Great Peacemaker teaches and shows them how to walk upright. May the war clubs and instruments of destruction be transformed into life giving means of grace. (Isaiah 2)

For the hearts of the people,
Created with your sacred fire burning within us, we confess that we struggle to live out of our great potential. When we do harm to your Creation, your creatures and fellow human beings, forgive us. When we fail to do all the good we can, in all the places we can, forgive us. When we turn away from your love and grace, forgive us.

Leader: Hear now the good news of Jesus Christ,
People: You are forgiven. I am forgiven. We are forgiven.
Leader: Peace be with you.

The Twenty Third Psalm
A Native-American Indian Version

The GREAT FATHER above a SHEPHERD CHIEF is.
I am His and with Him I want not.
He throws out to me a rope
and the name of the rope is love
and He draws me to where the grass is green
and the water is not dangerous,
and I eat and lie down and am satisfied.
Sometimes my heart is very weak and falls down
but He lifts me up again and draws me into a good road.
His name is WONDERFUL.

Sometime, it may be very soon, it may be a long long time,
He will draw me into a valley.
It is dark there, but I'll be afraid not,
for it is between those mountains
that the SHEPHERD CHIEF will meet me
and the hunger that I have in my heart all through life will be satisfied.

Sometimes he makes the love rope into a whip,
but afterwards He gives a staff to lean upon.
He spreads a table before me with all kinds of foods.
He put His hand upon my head and all the "tired" is gone.
My cup he fills till it runs over.
What I tell is true.
I lie not.

These roads that are "away ahead" will stay with me
through this life and after;
and afterwards I will go to live in the Big Teepee
and sit down with the SHEPHERD CHIEF forever.

-- From the West Michigan Conference