Elliot Ritzema

Tag: prayer

  • A Prayer in Solitude

    Since I accidentally pushed out a blank blog post yesterday to all who subscribe (oops!), I wanted to write something a little more substantive today to make it up to all of you.

    I’ve been reading Thomas Merton’s book Thoughts in Solitude in an attempt to learn as much as I can about how to live in this strange, isolated pandemic time. I came across this prayer:

    My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always, though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. (82)

    So many of us are unsettled because we can’t see the road ahead of us. But we never really see the road ahead of us; we only see hints and glimpses. And we never really know ourselves. All we can do, in this time or any time, is desire to please God, take good risks in the knowledge that he is with us, and trust in his provision day by day.

    May the peace of the Risen One be with you today and always.

  • Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Review

    I did not grow up in a church tradition that emphasized the praying of written prayers, but I have come to love them as an adult. I don’t use them as a replacement for my own spontaneous prayers, but as a way to “prime the pump,” giving me words to express what is in my heart.

    I was glad, then, to hear about Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book by David and Jeanie Gushee. Before encountering the book I had already heard of David, who is a Christian ethicist. The book includes short morning and evening prayers for every day of the year, with each pair of prayers being for a particular date. The subjects of the prayers are also aligned with the seasons of the liturgical year, such as Advent, Lent and Easter. The prayers for those holidays that move around on the calendar are lined up with the days they will be observed in 2013; for example, the prayers for Easter are on March 31. In later years, readers will have to adjust a bit if they want to pray an Easter-themed prayer on Easter day. There is a handy chart that gives the dates for the next five years.

    The sources for the prayers are intentionally broad. They are from Protestants, Catholics, Orthodox, men, women, and people from around the world. They range in time from the church fathers to the modern day; a few are from the Gushees themselves. Although they come from a variety of sources, they tend to be about the same length (50–150 words), thus making it easy for readers to create a rhythm of turning to these prayers for the same amount of time every day.

    I encountered this book just after I finished editing my own book of prayers for use in worship. From that experience, I would note that while this book is intended for devotional use, some of the prayers are also well-suited for a worship setting. The one thing I wish this book had is a ribbon for keeping your place as you go throughout the year.

    Publisher: Thomas Nelson
    Reading Length: 383 pages
    Rating: 4 stars

    Note: Thanks to Thomas Nelson for a review copy of this book.