prayers in the time of chaos

(I wrote this just after Christmas of this year, but I re-read it a few days ago and it resonates for this time too)

It's not a race. It's not a blurred sprint towards a finish line.

It is one foot in front of the other, a step becoming a half a mile and a mile a day.

There is too much, it is too difficult, too overwhelming if I lay here in bed and ponder injustice and sin and how we are to share His love.

I am just one broken vessel among millions, shattered and praying he'll put the shards back together.

And yet God chooses to dwell in us, to come and sit among the pieces, mending us back together so his love can be poured out into a basin that can both receive it and pour it out onto others.

Water, water, the living water!
Drink deeply, my daughter, I am here to fill your every need.
Drink deeply my dear, I am here to transform you, to make you who you were created to be.
Drink deeply my child and you will never again be the same.

Oh Abba, may you show me the way. Show me how to love you and my brothers and sisters on this day.

Show me how to love in the midst of tiredness. In the midst of selfishness and pride and sin. May you quell those forces and wash them away- that only your love would motivate and be known.

Time has passed and I am changed, thanks be to your holy name.
Time has come and gone and I am stronger, weaker
more broken, more healed. Thanks be to your holy name!
Time has spread itself wide
an open field stretched to the horizon.
I have breathed in its winds
and I have run its paths
And I am here.
On my knees, in your hands.
Praising you, O Lord,
maker of heaven and earth.
For all is yours
and in your nearness
I know peace.
Thanks be to your holy name!