The will to obey.

Deep calls to deep

    at the roar of your waterfalls;
all your breakers and your waves
    have gone over me.
By day the Lord commands His steadfast love,
    and at night His song is with me,
    a prayer to the God of my life. Psalm 42:7-8

Oh the deep, deep love of Jesus 
Vast, unmeasured, boundless, free 
Rolling as a mighty ocean 
In its fullness over me.

Lord, we pray not to get lost in the reality of our own depravity, but rather to find ourselves morning by morning in the light of Your mercy and redemption. Amen

New every morning, great is Thy faithfulness.

I shall not want, when I taste Your goodness.

When I am bowed down with sorrow I will lift up Your name

And the foxes in the vineyard will not steal my joy,

For You are good to me, good to me,

And I lift my eyes to the hills from where my heart is from

Your goodness and Your mercy shall follow me all of my life

I trust in Your goodness,

I trust in Your promise.

You liberate me from my own noise and my own chaos

From the chains of a lesser law You set me free

In the silence of the heart You speak

And it there that I will know You and You know me

You satisfy me till I am quiet and confident

In the work of the Spirit I cannot see.

In the silence of the heart You speak.

So yesterday momma and I helped out at the Interfaith Packathon, two hundredish people at the Muslim Community Center measuring exactly 388-390 grams of rice and beans dried vegetables and vitamins and spices into then sealed bags, 50,000 meals. And the event began with prayer, and there was a break for the two o’clock prayers as well.

And the heart-piercingly beautiful call to worship brought back so many memories of dusty skies over wide rivers.

And as the men knelt down on spread out carpets, I joined them in their prayer: Dear LORD God of heaven and earth, please reveal Yourself.  And may we have eyes to see and ears to hear.  And the will to obey. 

Dear LORD God of heaven and earth, here I am once again.

And I find myself much like Meg and Jo in Little Women, murmuring about once again shouldering the daily burdens after the holidays, “Oh, dear, how hard it does seem to take up our packs and go on,” sighed Meg the morning after the party, for now the holidays were over, the week of merrymaking did not fit her for going on easily with the tasks of every day life.

And me, huh. I had two weeks of beyond-imagination merrymaking, full of dinner parties and bouquets by my bedside from my beautiful sister, and parties and a lovely drive home and reading and resting and not working, because washing dishes is not work.

But of course, good old Marmee spoke truth into the story, “We are never too old for this, my dear, because it is a play we are playing all the time in one way or another. Our burdens are here, our road is before us, and the longing for goodness and happiness is the guide that leads us through many troubles and mistakes to the peace which is a true Celestial City.”

The will to obey.

Audrey Assad has sung truth into my morning as well.

You dwell in the songs that we are singing,
Rising to the Heavens, rising to Your heart, Your heart.
Our praises filling up the spaces
In between our frailty and everything You are
You are the keeper of my heart

And I'm restless, I'm restless
'Til I rest in You, 'til I rest in You
I am restless, I'm restless
'Til I rest in You, 'til I rest in You
Oh God, I wanna rest in You

The peace.

And because momma and I are a little crazy, we start off Sundays eating breakfast together over the both the New York Times and The Arizona Daily Star, and then we go on over to Trinity Presbyterian for the breaking of the bread and the passing of the peace, before we head off to our other places of worship.

The peace.

May it be so.

'Tink ob yer marcies, chillen! ‘Tink ob yer marcies!’’ added Jo.

LORD, who may dwell in your tabernacle? who may abide upon your holy hill? Whoever leads a blameless life and does what is right, who speaks the truth from his heart. There is no guile upon his tongue; he does no evil to his friend; he does not heap contempt upon his neighbor. Psalm 15

“Abide in me as I abide in you.” In these few words Jesus reveals the secret of the abundant life He is bringing into the world. This is the secret not only to our own fulfillment, but also to our fruitfulness, our ability to bring others in to share in the Divine Life. -Br. David Vryhof

Third Conversation with Brother Lawrence: He told me, that the foundation of the spiritual life in him is to have no other care, but faithfully to reject every other thought, that he might perform all his actions for the love of GOD.

That he had so often experienced the ready succors of Divine Grace upon all occasions, that from the same experience, when he had business to do, he did not think of it beforehand; but when it was time to do it, he found in GOD, as in a clear mirror, all that was fit for him to do. That of late he had acted thus, without anticipating care; but before the experience above mentioned, he had used it in his affairs.

That there needed neither art nor science for going to GOD, but only a heart resolutely determined to apply itself to nothing but Him, or for His sake, and to love Him only.

First of all, there is that business of living a blameless life as pretty much having control of one’s tongue… And if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body. Dear LORD, may it be.

I confess to being a grumbler.

And Strong’s Concordance lays it out clearly: A muttering, murmuring, low and suppressed discourse, the expression of secret and sullen discontent, murmuring, complaint.

And I sort of feel like the beginning of Little Women, where Meg bemoans packing up the burdens after a week of merrymaking. But good old Lawrence reminds me that the joy is in the journey, the step by step living in the love of God, Who pours down Divine Grace upon all occasions.

Abide.

I am to rest in Him.

And rather than a litany of grumbling and complaining, let my heart be filled with gratitude,

So while I think of it,

let me paint a thank-you on my palm

for this God, this laughter of the morning,

lest it go unspoken.

The Joy that isn't shared, I've heard,

dies young. –Anne Sexton

and

Be at rest, my soul,
O blessed secret of the true life that glorifies the Lord:
Not always does the busiest soul best serve him, but he that rests upon his faithful word.
Be at rest, let not your heart be rippled,
For tiny wavelets mar the image fair,
Which the still pool reflects of heaven's glory-and this the image he would have you bear.
Be at rest, my soul, for rest is service,
To the still heart God does his secrets tell...
For God is rest, and where he dwells is stillness,
And they who dwell in Him, His rest will share.
And what will meet the deep unrest around you,
But the calm peace of God that filled his breast?
For still a living Voice calls to the weary,
From Him who said, "come unto me and rest."

Be at rest, oh my soul.