Prayer and Perspective

Early this morning I rose to one of my monthly tasks these days, praying through the psalms for next month, and preparing to publish them under the "Prayers" link on the home page of my website at www.rootedwings.com.

I never cease to be amazed and blessed by this process, soon two years running, using the psalms designated for each Sunday of the Church Year. No matter where I find myself month by month, both in circumstance and mood, I am lifted out of myself to see life in greater perspective--just by reflecting with the psalmist on God's glory, faithfulness, and grace.

Well into the season of Lent by the end of next month, the themes center on opening one's soul in confession both of our sinfulness in God's presence and our faith in his redeeming grace. To confess either without also confessing the other is to miss the blessing of both. How can grace be experienced, for example, by anyone who hides from his or her great need of it? And what if one, confessing that need, is left only in the somber shadows with no relief?

Thus does God's word deliver us, not by efforts of our own to deserve his deliverance but by simply recalling and receiving again the deliverance he alone offers the penitent. What is required in prayer is not our effort so much as our willingness to open ourselves up as we are to him as he is. The hymnwriter said it well: Prayer is the soul's sincere desire, unuttered or expressed; the motion of a hidden fire that trembles in the breast (The Covenant Hymnal, 1973, No. 345).

The days of Lent this year will be different for me, having prayed through these psalms. Pray with me through those already posted for this month as Epiphany came to its end and Lent has begun. And after March 1, look for more to lend you the same blessed perspective they have offered me in praying through them.