Morning Coffee – Prayer Request

Today Jim is having surgery; surgery that we hope will tell us what has been going on in his body to cause him such distress.  He first saw our Doctor almost 5 weeks ago.  The first week he was treated for a bladder infection.  The second week he was treated for pneumonia.  Neither treatment helped him.  The third week he had a needle biopsy.  The fourth week was anxiously spent waiting for results.  Even after being sent on to the Mayo Clinic, the results came back “inconclusive”.  The next step in this journey is his surgical biopsy scheduled for today.  We are requesting prayers for peace and comfort for Jim and successful exploration by the surgeon resulting in a firm diagnosis so that treatment can begin as soon as possible.

⁵Trust in the LORD with all thine heart;
and lean not unto thine own understanding. 

Proverbs 3:5

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Liturgy and Prayer

Yours, Jack has been such a wonderful look into the life and faith of C.S. Lewis. I highly recommend this book! This morning I found this perspective of his interesting. He is comparing fixed forms of worship (liturgy and prayers) with extemporaneous worship. He writes in a letter dated April 1, 1952:

"The advantage of a fixed form of service is that we know what is coming. Extempore public prayer has this difficulty: we don’t know whether we can mentally join in it until we’ve heard it – it might be phoney or heretical. We are therefore called upon to carry on a critical and a devotional activity at the same moment: two things hardly compatible. In a fixed form we ought to have ‘gone through the motions’ before in our private prayers: the rigid form really sets our devotions free.

“I also find the more rigid it is, the easier it is to keep one’s thoughts from straying. Also it prevents any service getting too completely eaten up by whatever happens to be the preoccupation of the moment (a war, an election, or what not). The permanent shape of Christianity shows through. I don’t see how the extempore method can help becoming provincial and I think it has a great tendency to direct attention to the minister rather than to God.”

C.S. Lewis ~ Yours, Jack

I love the thought that “the rigid form really sets our devotions free”. That’s why liturgy is so moving. We know it well; we know what’s coming and we can enter it from the very first note or word. Even our simple table prayer – the one we’ve prayed for years and years – can be very devotional because it takes us immediately into a posture of thanksgiving.

For me this means no more struggling with impromptu public prayer. There are too many beautifully written prayers available; prayers that express exactly what I believe and that will allow me to worship unencumbered.

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Prayer for our Nation

"Most gracious God, we give thee hearty thanks for this good land in which our heritage is cast, for freedom to worship thee, for the glory of a people set at liberty, for the government in which we share.  Keep us ever mindful of the responsibilities thereby laid upon us and faithful to our trust; through him who is the truth that alone can make men free, even thy son Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen"

The Book of Prayers

Leon and Elfreida McCauley

c1954

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A Prayer for Good Friday

"We thank Thee for the knowledge of Thy love that forgives our sins; may we reflect it today, seeing only the best that is in others, that we may be kind all the day through.  Enable us to 'serve' and to 'give'. -- for Thine is the power and the glory forever.  Amen.

From God's Minute - A Book of 365 Daily Prayers Sixty Seconds Long for Home Worship (Copyright 1916 by L.M. Cross)

For Today

God Bless America!

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Prayer for the Day

This prayer by Phil Ware was part of Today's Verse from Heartlight.org.  Read the full devotional here.

Holy God, I know you are there! In the morning, in the evening, in the long nights, I know I am not alone. Thank you for knowing me and going with me through all my days. Please make your presence known to me this day as I seek to honor you in what I do and say. Through Jesus my Lord I ask this. Amen.

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