Category Archives: Prayer

Let them be holy

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I started praying a new prayer for my girls a few months ago.

Dear Lord, please let them be holy.  Protect them from my sins, vices and falls and guide them home with Your Holy Light keeping them pure and white and making them holy.

Guess what, since beginning this prayer He is changing me again! I have fallen in love with Our Blessed Mother, Saint Mary.  I was drawn to a book about her and now I long to pray to her, I look to her as a guide, a mentor and as the perfect example of mothering.

I didn’t tie these two events together at first, but as I think more about it I believe they are connected.  How could I, a person loaded down with baggage filled with selfishness, greed, unkindness, and sin ever hope to raise children who are holy?!?!  Alone in my greed, selfishness, and ever growing pile of wrong doings, it would not be possible, but with God leading the way anything is possible.

Thank You My Love for opening my eyes once more to one of Your Own Beloved, Your Queen, who so desperately wants to show us the Way, Your Way, Yahweh.

Our new prayer

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I am sure you have heard this prayer, and have maybe said it yourself or with your children at night.

Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord my soul to keep
Angels watch me through the night
And wake me with the morning light

I grew up saying it with my sisters and started saying it with my children awhile ago, but recently we changed the words and I LOVE IT.  Now it more closely embodies my prayer for my girls.

I pray that their way home is straight and always lit with a light from above.

Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord my soul to keep
Please cleanse my eyes all through the night
So I may follow Your angel’s light

Remember our true home!

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I am not usually a cynic, but today after spending too much at the grocery I arrived home, checked the mail and found a magazine that had a picture of probably a $5 million dollar home on the front with the article titled, “Love your home!”, and I thought to myself… seriously?  Do the people writing and publishing this magazine really believe that looking at photos of this outrageously extravagant house will help me and others love our homes?  Seriously… do they really believe this?

I took the magazine straight to the recycling box, because I certainly know that looking at it would not help me to love my home, but I have been wondering why it bothered me so much today.  Most days this wouldn’t phase me or bother me, but it did today.

Maybe my annoyance with this magazine is because, as scary as it is to say or to type, in a way it reminds me of my own expensive home, of my own excess, of my own greed, and of my own issues with envy?  Maybe for a moment I forgot about my true home?

Lord please be with me and remove envy from my heart and replace it with Your generosity and gratitude because I long to always love the home You have given to me while I am here, but most of all I long to always remember that You are my true home.

Please help me, I can’t do it without You, my Love.

He makes all things new!

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Since I first thought, prayed and wrote about Our Best Life, I have changed, I am different… I think I am becoming new.  I have told friends that I don’t know why this change has come about, but I am starting to realize that I  do know why… it is because of Him, and only Him.

When I first starting praying for Our Best Life, someone very close to me was going through two very difficult and life changing events.  Her suffering and pain finally opened my eyes to my own selfishness and allowed me to step outside of myself for a moment and begin thinking of and praying for others by praying for Our Best Life.

This changed my direction, but He in His infinite humility still didn’t step in until I invited Him in through a prayer to be the seed that has been sown on good soil.

He heard my prayer and came running to help me.  Regardless of how much work there is to do in me, He pushed up His sleeves and began working to make me new!  Anything kind, loving, patient, thoughtful, considerate, generous that I do is because of Him… it is NOT me!  There is still so much to be done, but He is here and my thoughts run to Him as I talk with my husband and my children, work on homework and play with my children, read, listen to music, wash dishes, fold and iron clothes, clean our home, make our dinner and even while kneeling on the floor a few weeks ago to clean up my daughters vomit.

Thank You My Love for being here with me… I do not just need You, I desire You from the depths of my heart.

Answered Prayer!

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I was looking back through some previous blogs I have written (I think I am my biggest fan… ha ha ha), and I came across a blog I wrote in July 2012 titled Betrayer and Beloved?.

At the end of this blog I asked our sweet Jesus, “Please help me to love Judas Iscariot as you love him.”

Guess what I just realized… I have fallen in love with him.  I fell in love with him during Lent 2013, and I have been thinking of him, crying for him, praying for him and loving him ever since.

I think our sweet Jesus answered my prayer and has shown me how much he loves him by opening my heart to Judas Iscariot and helping me to fall in love with him too.

Knock and the door will be opened to you (Matthew 7:7)… ask Jesus to show you how much he loves someone you don’t understand, someone you fear, someone you dislike or might even hate and just maybe your eyes and your heart will be opened to how much Jesus loves this person and you too will begin to rise above your fear and hatred and will begin to fall in love this person too.

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you (Matthew 7:7), my sweet friends!

Cleansing

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Sometimes when I am working out I like to pray to be a straw that is full of holes so that anything good poured into me from above will not be held within me, but instead will flow through all of my holes surrounding everyone I encounter or see with His Grace.

As you know I have been going to the gym pretty regularly for the last 5 months trying to get back in shape. Over the last few weeks I have started really focusing on trying to improve  my diet and have started reading about body cleansing. I read an interesting article a few weeks ago that discussed the benefits of sitting in a sauna after a workout and how this can help cleanse many toxins from your body. After reading this I started sitting in the sauna of my gym for a few min at least once a week.

Today while I was sitting in the sauna following my workout, it hit me! As I watched the sweat drip down my arms, I realized I am already full of holes… my body is covered in tiny pores.  I am a straw full of holes… we all are!

I think now I need to focus on cleaning out my own physical and spiritual gunk so that someday the clogs will be cleared and everything that pours forth will be clean and full of His Glory.

I am cleaning out my friends… please pray for me!

The Lord is God

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My husband and I went to Ethiopia about 10 years ago with Habitat for Humanity.  We were there for three weeks and we helped begin 8 houses in Jimma.  By the end of our stay the foundations had been dug and laid, and the walls of each home were about waist high.

We went because we wanted to help, but was the primary objective really for us to come and help carry bricks or did I miss a deeper lesson?

Looking back I am a little sad to see how much I failed to really see during our visit, but I am thankful for my memory which isn’t always the best, but usually holds onto the things that don’t seem important at the time, but later prove to be quite relevant and important.

The other day one of our Ethiopian Habitat leaders came to mind, Elias.  I haven’t thought about him in a long time, but I was so happy to remember him. Thinking of him made me smile!

He was with us throughout our entire stay in Ethiopia.  He met our group in Addis Ababa, traveled with us to Jimma, worked along side our group everyday and then saw us all the way back to the international airport in Addis Ababa at the end of our visit.

He was a quiet and thoughtful man.  He was born and raised in Ethiopia and had the opportunity to study engineering abroad.  After his studies he returned home.  I remember he told us how he loved Harrison Ford movies and I remember him eating traditional Ethiopian food at every meal, even at breakfast.  I am not sure why this surprised me at the time considering that we were in Ethiopia, but for some reason it did and every morning I was shocked once again to see him eating injera with wat for breakfast.

Most of all though, I remember watching him bow his head and pray before every meal.  I noticed it and I registered it enough to remember, but the beauty of his gratitude didn’t truly touch me at the time.  I can’t even recall if I had the consideration to bow my head and give him a moment of silence at each meal… I hope that I did, but I can’t say for cetain.

The name Elias means The Lord is God.  I think my friend’s name was well chosen and for the short time I spent with him, he truly lived it’s meaning every day.

I pray for a heart full of gratitude like my friend Elias, and I am so thankful that 10 years later, his message of thanksgiving and love for our Lord, God, is finally getting through to me.

Who would you remember?

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Imagine that you work for the post office manually sorting the mail.  I am sure that you would see thousands of letters come through every day.  Do you think that you would remember anyone specific?

I have been thinking about it and I think there are probably three types of people that would stand out among the rest of the mail.

1.  The first person I would remember would be the sick child in town who receives hundreds of letters each week.  After seeing so many letters go through my post office for this child I would probably want to meet him or her to find out how someone so young had already touched so many lives.

2.  The second person I would remember would be the person in town who sends hundreds of letters each week to their fellow townspeople, their neighbors.  After seeing so many letters go through my post office from this person I would probably want to meet them as well and find out where he or she finds the time to touch so many lives.

3.  Finally the third I would remember would be the person who sends hundreds of letters to themselves.  It might cross my mind that this person needs help, and doesn’t really understand the purpose of the postal system.  I don’t think meeting this person to explain in more depth the purpose of the postal system would be useful, because clearly they understand the logistics of sending mail, but seem to be missing the depth behind the technicalities.

I think instead I might to try and arrange for #3 to accidentally meet #2 who is sending so many letters to others.  If they met by chance due to incorrect delivery of some of  #2’s hundreds of letters being delivered to #3, then maybe #2 could indirectly help #3 better understand the depth behind the logistics of the postal system.

I know there probably aren’t very many people, if any, like #3 when actually sending mail, but when praying is this the case?

If prayer is somewhat like this scenario, I hope that I will try harder to be more like our friend #2.   I want God to know me as His child who sends love out to all of my brothers and sisters, not as His child who can think of no else but myself when speaking with Him.

I know I still have a lot of work to do, but at least I think I now have the compass pointed in the right direction.

How will we know Him?

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If you were alive during Jesus’ time on earth, would you have known who He was? Would you have felt something stir in the depths of your soul when you first saw Him?   Would you have stopped to listen to Him?  Would you have followed Him?

I don’t know if I would have known, I don’t know if I would have truly seen Him, and I don’t know if I would have followed Him.

Wondering about this makes me so sad as I picture the possibility that I might have walked right by our Lord and Savior, our sweet Jesus, without a second glance.

I don’t want to walk by Him. I want to stop and kneel as He passes by me, I want to crawl behind Him and touch the earth that He has just graced with bottom of His beautiful foot and I want to yearn for Him to turn towards me and smile.

For now I want to prepare to truly see Him and know Him when He returns by looking for Him in everyone I see.  If I can find Him hidden in everyone I see, then maybe I will be blessed with the opportunity to see Him and know Him in His full and glorious form someday.

Jesus, please help me to look for You and see You in everyone I meet.

Let the celebration continue…

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Jesus is here, Jesus is born, Jesus is with us and yet what are we doing?

We are quickly taking down our decorations and we are preparing ourselves for the grind, for the coldest part of our winter and the coldest time in some of our hearts.  Our heads are down and the parties are over.

Was it the same back then in Bethlehem?

The angels were not still singing their praises for us to see and the shepherds had to move on with their flocks.  A few still sought Him in this quiet and peaceful time, but the majority of people returned to the routine of their lives.

Yet in Matthew 9:15
Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.”

This is not the time to return to our normal and every day lives.  He is here, He is born, He is with us!  I pray to continue seeking and celebrating because He is here!

Glory to God in the highest and on earth may we all seek Your peace!