Tag: prayer

But By His Grace: Bearing Your Weight

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The bridge of grace will bear your weight…
~Charles Spurgeon

Where God tears great gaps
we should not try to fill  them with human words.
They should remain open.
Our only comfort is the God of the resurrection,
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who also was and is (our) God.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer from “Circular Letters in the Church Struggle”

Great gaps are being torn in families, kept separate
in hospital ICUs and overflowing emergency rooms,
where patients struggle for breath and fight for life –
yet too sick, with too much risk
for loved ones to be near.

Christ too knew separation from His Father,
a chasm that appeared wholly unbridgeable-
forsaken, suffering for His brothers and sisters
by paying with His life
a ransom we could never satisfy:
we being so dead broke
and captive to our sin.

His grace is the only bridge able to bear our weight,
even now
even now
when our hearts break with uncertainty and fear.

We seek the comfort of
a grace strong enough
to fill our every hole
bridge our every gap
carry hope to our hopelessness
and restore us wholly to our Father
who was and is our God.

Lord, comfort us
by spanning our troubled waters,
bearing our weighty burdens,
to make sure we get safely to the Other Side
where Your arms await us.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller


But By His Grace: In Solitudes of Peace

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Now a red, sleepy sun above the rim
Of twilight stares along the quiet weald,
And the kind, simple country shines revealed
In solitudes of peace, no longer dim.
The old horse lifts his face and thanks the light,
Then stretches down his head to crop the green.
All things that he has loved are in his sight;
The places where his happiness has been
Are in his eyes, his heart, and they are good.
~Siegfried Sassoon from “Break of Day”

When we are at war,
whether deep in the foxhole
hiding from the enemy,
or fighting against a wily pathogen
which makes its hidden way, person to person,
we sing our battle hymn without ceasing.

Amid the suffering
we dream of better days
and an untroubled past,
when the hunter and hunted was merely a game,
not real life and even more real death.

This is war against a contagious disease,
not against one another.

Move away from reading 24 hour headlines.
Avoid being crushed in the numbers of viral dead and dying;
ignore the politics of power
or by those frantically salvaging shredded investments
or hoarding the last from bare shelves.

Do not forget
how the means of peace was
sent to earth
directly from God
by one Man walking among us.

So stay home, giving the enemy no fresh place to invade.
Pray for those who sacrifice much to care for the ill.

A new day breaks fresh each morning
and folds gently and quietly each evening.
Be glad to live another day
with all those things you love within your sight:
so glad, so grateful, such glory
to be reminded how rich we all are.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
You are speaking truth to power, you are laying down our swords
Replanting every vineyard ’til a brand new wine is poured
Your peace will make us one

I’ve seen you in our home fires burning with a quiet light
You are mothering and feeding in the wee hours of the night
Your gentle love is patient, you will never fade or tire
Your peace will make us one

Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Your peace will make us one

In the beauty of the lilies, you were born across the sea
With a glory in your bosom that is still transfiguring
Dismantling our empires ’til each one of us is free
Your peace will make us one

Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Your peace will make us one

He Accepts Us As We Are: Restless and Full of Longing

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How often we look upon God as our last and feeblest resource!
We go to Him because we have nowhere else to go.
And then we learn that the storms of life have driven us,
not upon the rocks,
but into the desired haven.
~George MacDonald

photo by Nate Gibson

Everlasting God,
in whom we live and move and have our being:
You have made us for yourself,
so that our hearts are restless
until they rest in you.
There is a different kind of prayer without ceasing;
it is longing.
Whatever you may be doing,
if you long for the day of everlasting rest
do not cease praying.
If you do not wish to cease praying,
then do not cease your longing.
Your persistent longing is your persistent voice.
But when love grows cold, the heart grows silent.
If you are filled with longing all the time,
you will keep crying out,
and if your love perseveres,
your cry will be heard without fail.
~Augustine of Hippo from  Augustine’s Expositions of the Psalms

C.S. Lewis writes of his “inconsolable longing, almost like a heartbreak” experiencing grief after losing his wife to cancer. He describes “the stab, the pang” of such longing, a visceral sense of being emptied completely and hungering to be refilled.

God accepts our yearning restless emptiness as a prayer for restoration. He hears our ceaseless cry and He too weeps with us.

May we continue to long for the refuge, the safe haven, that only can be found in Him.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller

I’m running in circles
It’s a steep hill to climb
My own understanding won’t cut it this time
I’m feeling the pressure
Believing the lies
But I want to believe this life is not mine

I’m left undone
By the seas You have split
My fear-waging a battle, I’m left more equipped
It’s like we’re face to face
This heaven on land
Even when I fight, it’s from the palm of Your hand

Here’s my mountain
Now break down my walls
I am confident Your hand’s in every rise
And every fall

You shattered my scares
And drowned me in peace
I’m not tethered to fear, in Your presence they cease
My heart, it is won
You alone are enough
I am done with my searching, it’s You that I want

Here’s my mountain
Now break down my walls
I am confident Your hand’s in every rise
And every fall

I hear You in the whispers
And in the sonnets of the waves
How I love the One who carries
How I love the One who saves
I see You in my trial
When my pain turns into song
How I love the One who tells me
Not to stray but I belong

And just like the tides
It’s highs and it’s lows
I know You’re my constant,
You won’t waver or go
~Olivia Kieffer

He Accepts Us As We Are: Hiding Nothing

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You can hide nothing from God.
The mask you wear before men will do you no good before Him.
He wants to see you as you are,
He wants to be gracious to you.
You do not have to go on lying to yourself and your brothers,
as if you were without sin;
you can dare to be a sinner.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer from Life Together


In your hands

The dog, the donkey, surely they know
They are alive.
Who would argue otherwise?

But now, after years of consideration,
I am getting beyond that.
What about the sunflowers? What about
The tulips, and the pines?

Listen, all you have to do is start and
There’ll be no stopping.
What about mountains? What about water
Slipping over rocks?

And speaking of stones, what about
The little ones you can
Hold in your hands, their heartbeats
So secret, so hidden it may take years

Before, finally, you hear them?
~Mary Oliver from Swan: Prose and Poems

When I myself go to the doctor, I am to trust I’m seeing someone who is meant to know me thoroughly enough that he or she will help me move out of illness into better health. This is how acceptance feels: trusting someone enough to come out of hiding.

As a physician myself, I am reminded by the amount of “noticing” I need to do in the course of my work.  Each patient, and there are so many,  deserves my full attention for the few minutes we are together.  I start my clinical evaluation the minute we sit down together and I begin taking in all the complex verbal and non-verbal clues offered up, sometimes unwittingly, by another human being.

Now, during the COVID19 pandemic, my interactions with patients are all “virtual” so I don’t have the ability to observe as I usually do, so I need them to tell me outright what is going on in their lives, their minds and their hearts in spoken or written words. I can’t ‘see’ them, even on a screen, in the same way.

How might someone call out to me when their faces are hidden?

I can’t witness first hand the trembling hands, their sweatiness, the scars of self injury.  Still, I am their audience and a witness to their struggle; even more, I must understand it in order to best assist them.  My brain must rise to the occasion of taking in another person, accepting them for who they are, offering them the gift of compassion and simply be there for them, just them, right now.

God doesn’t struggle in His Holy work as I do in my clinical duties. He knows us thoroughly because He made us; He knows our thoughts before we put them into words. There is no point in staying hidden from Him.

He holds us, little pebbles that we are, in His Hand, and He discerns our secret heartbeats.

We, the hidden, are His.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller

I will search in the silence for your hiding place.
In the quiet, Lord, I seek your face.
Where can I discover the wellsprings of your love?
Is my search and seeking in vain?
How can I recover the beauty of your word?
In the silence I call out your name.
Where can I find shelter to shield me from the storm?
To find comfort, though dark be the night?
For I know that my welfare is ever in your sight.
In the shadows I long for your light.
Lead me in your footsteps along your ancient way.
Let me walk in the love of the Lord.
Your wisdom is my heart’s wealth, a blessing all our days.
In the silence I long for Your world.
~Liam Lawton

He Accepts Us As We Are: In Rock’s Fixity

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I rise today
in the power’s strength, invoking the Trinity
believing in threeness,
confessing the oneness,
of creation’s Creator.

I rise today
in heaven’s might,
in sun’s brightness,
in moon’s radiance,
in fire’s glory,
in lightning’s quickness,
in wind’s swiftness,
in sea’s depth,
in earth’s stability,
in rock’s fixity.

I rise today
with the power of God to pilot me,
God’s strength to sustain me,
God’s wisdom to guide me,
God’s eye to look ahead for me,
God’s ear to hear me,
God’s word to speak for me,
God’s hand to protect me,
God’s way before me,
God’s shield to defend me,
God’s host to deliver me,
from snares of devils,
from evil temptations,
from nature’s failings,
from all who wish to harm me,
far or near,
alone and in a crowd.

Around me I gather today all these powers
against every cruel and merciless force
to attack my body and soul.

May Christ protect me today
against poison and burning,
against drowning and wounding,
so that I may have abundant reward;
Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me;
Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me;
Christ to the right of me, Christ to the left of me;
Christ in my lying, Christ in my sitting, Christ in my rising;
Christ in the heart of all who think of me,
Christ on the tongue of all who speak to me,
Christ in the eye of all who see me,
Christ in the ear of all who hear me.

For to the Lord belongs
salvation,
and to the Lord belongs salvation
and to Christ belongs salvation.
May your salvation, Lord, be with us always.

—”Saint Patrick’s Breastplate,”
Old Irish, eighth-century prayer.

St. Patrick’s grave marker

Every year on March 17, St. Patrick is little remembered for his selfless missionary work in Ireland in the fifth century. When we visited his grave in Ireland – a humble stone fixed upon on a hill top next to a cathedral overlooking the sea – I wondered what he would make of how this day, dubbed with his name, is celebrated now.

Perhaps Patrick would observe that this year, March 17 is much quieter and more contemplative than typical. Worldwide we are considering our frail and fragile physical and economic vulnerabilities due to the pandemic viral outbreak.

Patrick, in his prayer, urges us to rise up to meet God’s power of salvation in our lives, even in the toughest scariest times.

God is our Rock and our Redeemer. We are fixed upon Him.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller

May the strength of God pilot us,
May the wisdom of God instruct us,
May the hand of God protect us,
May the word of God direct us.
Be always ours this day and for evermore.

He Sees Us As We Are: Tending the Sick

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Keep watch, dear Lord,
with those who work, or watch, or weep this night,
and give your angels charge over those who sleep.
Tend the sick, Lord Christ;
give rest to the weary,
bless the dying,
soothe the suffering,
pity the afflicted,
shield the joyous;
and all for your love’s sake.
Amen.
~Common Book of Prayer

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.
1Corinthians 12:27

Christ has no body now but yours.
No hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which he looks compassion on this world.
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands,
yours are the feet,
yours are the eyes,
you are his body.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours.
~Teresa of Avila

The whole mass of Christians
are the physical organism through which Christ acts—
that we are his fingers and muscles,
the cells of His body.
~C.S. Lewis

Thousands are working around the clock
to tend to those who are ill and hurting,
~even at their own peril~
just as those who love the body of Christ
have done through centuries
of plagues and pandemics.

They know,
despite their own weariness,
each one who suffers,
each dear one,
is part of His body,
part of Our body.

We are the cells of His Being
still walking, weeping, loving
on this trembling earth.

This year’s Lenten theme on Barnstorming:

God sees us as we are,
loves us as we are,
and accepts us as we are.
But by His grace,
He does not leave us where we are.
~Tim Keller


From the love of my own comfort
From the fear of having nothing
From a life of worldly passions
Deliver me O God

From the need to be understood
From the need to be accepted
From the fear of being lonely
Deliver me O God Deliver me O God

And I shall not want,
I shall not want when I taste Your goodness
I shall not want when I taste Your goodness
I shall not want
From the fear of serving others
From the fear of death or trial
From the fear of humility
Deliver me O God Deliver me O God
~Audrey Assad “I Shall Not Want”

So Then, Live

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It is not only prayer that gives God glory but work.
Smiting on an anvil,
sawing a beam,
whitewashing a wall,
driving horses,
sweeping,
scouring,
everything gives God some glory
if being in his grace you do it as your duty.
To go to communion worthily gives God great glory,
but to take food in thankfulness and temperance
gives him glory too.
To lift up the hands in prayer gives God glory,
but a man with a dungfork in his hand,
a woman with a slop pail,
gives him glory too.
He is so great that all things give him glory
if you mean they should.
So then, my brethren, live.
~Gerard Manley Hopkins – Poems and Prose of Gerard Manley Hopkins

Photo of Aaron Janicki haying with his Oberlander team in Skagit County courtesy of Tayler Rae
photo by Tayler Rae

Thanks in large part to how messily we humans live, this world is a grimy place.  

As an act of worship, we work at cleaning up after ourselves.  Hands that clean toilets, scrub floors, carry bedpans, pick up garbage might as well be clasped in prayer–it is in such mundane tasks God is glorified.

I spend time every day carrying buckets and wielding a pitchfork because it is my way of restoring order to the disorder inherent in human life.  It is with gratitude that I’m able to pick up one little corner of my world, making stall beds tidier for our farm animals by mucking up their messes and in so doing, I’m cleaning up a piece of me at the same time.

I never want to forget the mess I’m in and the mess I am.  I never want to forget to clean up after myself.  I never want to feel it is a mere and mundane chore to worship with dungfork and slop pail.

It is my privilege.  It is His gift to me.
It is Grace that comes alongside me, to keep pitching the muck and carrying the slop when I am too weary to do it myself.