Today’s text
1 John 2:12-14
“I am writing to you little children, because your sins are forgiven on account of his name. I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young people, because you have conquered the evil one. I write to you, children, because you know the Father. I write to you, fathers, because you know him who was from the beginning. I write to you young, people, because you are strong and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one” (1 John 2:12-14).
Prayer
What is this joy that bubbles from source unseen? What is this buoyancy in which I bob atop restless waves that are powerless now, to drag me to the depths? What is this consolation lifting me above the daily struggle to claim the day as a place of grace?
There is no need for the struggle this morning. The war is done and won, and you have carried the day by some process beyond my perception or understanding. There is just this joy in the morning that flows from the simple awareness that you abide, Eternal One, and abide in me. The evil that disfigures life, undermining the vitality and vibrancy of just being alive is no where in sight. It has fled the field of my soul.
For I know you who are from the beginning. Ask me what I know, and I can only answer, ‘not much.’ My knowledge is poor in concept, poorer still in content. It is but simple awareness of a mystery on which I would bet my life, and have. It is loving awareness of Love Abiding. May I name you this way? It seems fitting.
You abide. Amid the daily and the drab, the demands and destruction, you abide. Amid seemingly forsaken moments of such pain and loss that you are abolished from our vision, you abide. Love abides to overcome the evil that disfigures and destroys--and to give awareness of you who are Love Abiding, the ocean of grace in which we float. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
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Friday, March 09, 2007
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Today’s text
1 John 2:9-11
“Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,’ while hating a brother or sister, is still in darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates another believer is in the darkness, and does not know the way to go, because the darkness has brought on blindness” (1 John 2:9-11).
Prayer
Love is sight. Anything less is spiritual blindness. I always suspected as much. For when my heart is closed to another human soul not much penetrates my brittle shell. Refusing to love, I remain in the dark, unable and unwilling to see the frailty and truth and of human hearts beating next to mine.
So again and again I pray: Help me Dearest Heart of Mercy. Help me to receive. Open my ears to listen. Make me agnostic again: one who knows he does not know and thus must closely attend to the mystery of those who sit, stand and struggle alongside the enigma of my own life.
Dearest Heart, may I listen and hear, which is to say may I love all whom I encounter for the mystery they are, a mystery hidden in your love. You know them all, and me, which is to say that you love each of us fully, completely, without a moment’s pause. Only love knows and sees the deep heart of another soul--and the heart of the universe, your heart.
To love is to see. To refuse to love is to stumble in dark illusion about who we are and what our life is to be. This day, Holy Light, may I see as you see, to love as you love. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
1 John 2:9-11
“Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,’ while hating a brother or sister, is still in darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates another believer is in the darkness, and does not know the way to go, because the darkness has brought on blindness” (1 John 2:9-11).
Prayer
Love is sight. Anything less is spiritual blindness. I always suspected as much. For when my heart is closed to another human soul not much penetrates my brittle shell. Refusing to love, I remain in the dark, unable and unwilling to see the frailty and truth and of human hearts beating next to mine.
So again and again I pray: Help me Dearest Heart of Mercy. Help me to receive. Open my ears to listen. Make me agnostic again: one who knows he does not know and thus must closely attend to the mystery of those who sit, stand and struggle alongside the enigma of my own life.
Dearest Heart, may I listen and hear, which is to say may I love all whom I encounter for the mystery they are, a mystery hidden in your love. You know them all, and me, which is to say that you love each of us fully, completely, without a moment’s pause. Only love knows and sees the deep heart of another soul--and the heart of the universe, your heart.
To love is to see. To refuse to love is to stumble in dark illusion about who we are and what our life is to be. This day, Holy Light, may I see as you see, to love as you love. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Tuesday, March 6, 2007
Today’s text
1 John 2:8-10
“Yet, I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,’ while hating a brother or sister, is still in darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling” (1 John 2:8-10).
Prayer
Passing away? Do you mean it, Holy Mystery? I heard the news today, and the darkness is well with us. Ancient hatreds erupt in murderous orgies. Greed and the will to power poison as many as ever, maybe more, immunizing human hearts from the suffering and death of multitudes. Violence desecrates our homes. Fountains of tears flow behind the doors of even the best-kept homes.
The voice on the radio reflects on the potential brutality hidden in every human heart. I don’t want to believe him, but there is too much evidence to make much of an argument. Darkness pulls at our hearts, dragging us back toward the primordial chaos from which you first made light, beauty and order. There remains a voice in me, too, that loves conquest more than peace.
Until my heart draws near to you, who are always near. Dwelling in your love, that voice falls silent. Standing before you who are Love Unimaginable, the voice disappears. It vanishes. For where you are, the darkness finds no room. It is driven out.
You, who will fill all time and space, seek to fill me with your love. And there are moments when, to my greatest joy, you succeed. Your love is the light that banishes the ancient darkness in human hearts. You exorcise the voice of violence that loves personal conquest more than the victory of divine grace.
Today, let me live in awareness of you that I may live in your light, a sign of your blessed future. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
1 John 2:8-10
“Yet, I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,’ while hating a brother or sister, is still in darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling” (1 John 2:8-10).
Prayer
Passing away? Do you mean it, Holy Mystery? I heard the news today, and the darkness is well with us. Ancient hatreds erupt in murderous orgies. Greed and the will to power poison as many as ever, maybe more, immunizing human hearts from the suffering and death of multitudes. Violence desecrates our homes. Fountains of tears flow behind the doors of even the best-kept homes.
The voice on the radio reflects on the potential brutality hidden in every human heart. I don’t want to believe him, but there is too much evidence to make much of an argument. Darkness pulls at our hearts, dragging us back toward the primordial chaos from which you first made light, beauty and order. There remains a voice in me, too, that loves conquest more than peace.
Until my heart draws near to you, who are always near. Dwelling in your love, that voice falls silent. Standing before you who are Love Unimaginable, the voice disappears. It vanishes. For where you are, the darkness finds no room. It is driven out.
You, who will fill all time and space, seek to fill me with your love. And there are moments when, to my greatest joy, you succeed. Your love is the light that banishes the ancient darkness in human hearts. You exorcise the voice of violence that loves personal conquest more than the victory of divine grace.
Today, let me live in awareness of you that I may live in your light, a sign of your blessed future. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
Monday, March 05, 2007
Monday, March 5, 2007
Today’s text
1 John 2:7-8
“Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you have heard from the beginning; the old commandment is the word you have heard. Yet, I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining” (1 John 2:7-8).
Prayer
True in me? If so, that’s the best news I have heard lately. For I know what your commandment is. You command what you give, and you give yourself. You delight to share the eternal, uncreated love that is the source and goal of all that is, my source and goal.
Can it be that your love--the holy and eternal necessity of your life--is also true in me? If so, then I bear the mystery of your life and love, and you command me to live according to that which you have done and continue to do in me.
And I know this is freedom, a liberty I seldom fully know but which I constantly crave. I long to be free, loving, moving through my life unencumbered by the impatience, grudges, anxieties, angers, indignities and tender wounds I carry. They are a sack of dead weight, freighting my heart, binding me to the ground when I long to soar. I hunger to delight in the freedom of flight known only as I live the love that you are in me, acting and speaking from the commandment, the principle, the holy and priceless gift at the core of my soul.
Only you can pry this weight of death from my shoulders, and you do. But you, Loving Mystery, don’t pry or struggle: you simply love, and love me. In awareness that I am fully loved and bear this love, the burdens of the past evaporate, and my soul is free to be that command, that beauty that is true in me and in all in whom you are pleased to dwell.
Only your love can drive off the burdens that tie our souls to earth. So let us live aware of your love that our souls may soar. Surely, that will make you smile. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
1 John 2:7-8
“Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you have heard from the beginning; the old commandment is the word you have heard. Yet, I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining” (1 John 2:7-8).
Prayer
True in me? If so, that’s the best news I have heard lately. For I know what your commandment is. You command what you give, and you give yourself. You delight to share the eternal, uncreated love that is the source and goal of all that is, my source and goal.
Can it be that your love--the holy and eternal necessity of your life--is also true in me? If so, then I bear the mystery of your life and love, and you command me to live according to that which you have done and continue to do in me.
And I know this is freedom, a liberty I seldom fully know but which I constantly crave. I long to be free, loving, moving through my life unencumbered by the impatience, grudges, anxieties, angers, indignities and tender wounds I carry. They are a sack of dead weight, freighting my heart, binding me to the ground when I long to soar. I hunger to delight in the freedom of flight known only as I live the love that you are in me, acting and speaking from the commandment, the principle, the holy and priceless gift at the core of my soul.
Only you can pry this weight of death from my shoulders, and you do. But you, Loving Mystery, don’t pry or struggle: you simply love, and love me. In awareness that I am fully loved and bear this love, the burdens of the past evaporate, and my soul is free to be that command, that beauty that is true in me and in all in whom you are pleased to dwell.
Only your love can drive off the burdens that tie our souls to earth. So let us live aware of your love that our souls may soar. Surely, that will make you smile. Amen.
--Pr. David L. Miller
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