“Let Me Fit Myself into Your Setup”

Over the last while, I’ve been using a prayer book called, simply, Morning and Evening Prayers by Cornelius Plantinga. These prayers are often simultaneously simple and profound. It’s a rare morning (or evening) when I don’t find language in his prayers to anchor my own experience and aspiration.

Today, for example:

To you, holy God, I lift my heart at the outset of this day, trusting your faithfulness and looking for opportunities you may open before me. You have always been good to me beyond my deserving. You have never led me wrong. Today, I want to be in your hands and at your disposal. If I should meet someone today who is wounded, let me show mercy. If guilty, let me offer forgiveness. If depressed, let me give encouragement.

Let me become a little wiser today. Let me know your creation—its boundaries and limits, it’s laws and rhythms, its times and seasons. I want to understand today that I going to reap what I sow. Let me know that you are my superior, that other human beings are my peers, that nonhuman creation has its own integrity that I am blessed to accept. Let me fit myself into your setup.

Today, good God, I want to believe that to spend myself is the way to thrive, that to flourish I must help others to flourish.

Help me today to be discerning. Let me see the difference between pleasure and joy and between sentimentality and compassion. Let me see that facts are stubborn things and that I shouldn’t try to finesse them to suit my own wishes. Good God, I need wisdom. I need to understand deep down that the more I talk, the less people will listen; that if my word is no good, people will not trust me; that if I refuse to work hard and take pains, I am unlikely to do much of any consequence; that boasting of my accomplishments does not make people admire them.

Help me today to understand that many valuable things, including happiness and deep sleep, come to me only if I do not try hard for them. Give me wisdom, O God. Let me commit not only to your Son but also to his program for living in the world. Let me understand that self-expenditure leads finally not to depletion but to abundant life.

I give myself to you today. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.