My Daily Prayers 2

I'm heading to bed right now and wanted to quickly share one other prayer that is near and dear to my heart. I'm not completely sure where it stems from, but it very similar to a couple songs that I love a lot. The songs are: Brandon Heath - "Give Me Your Eyes," the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi - "Make Me a Channel of Your Peace, and a church song - "Open My Eyes."

The common theme of all these songs is that they all ask God to help us love like him, using us to reveal his love to the world. Brandon Heath talks about struggling to care about people going somewhere and asks God to be able to see them as He does. In the Song of St. Francis of Assisi, he asks God to work through him, for God to use him as an instrument to bring His LOVE to the world. Finally, in the church song, it has the line: "Give me your heart Lord, help me to love like you" - that pretty much sums it up.

So here is a version of my prayer:


"God, help me to see other people as you do. Help me to love like you do, to have compassion like you do, to forgive people like you do. God please help me not jump to quick conclusions on others or make any false assumptions. Help me to be open minded, patient, and understanding in dealing with people. But most of all God, work through me to bring Your love to the world. Use me as a channel of your peace. Through my actions today and tomorrow, reveal yourself to others through me. Help me to spread Your love and Your son's love to the world."

And that is what I pray for every night before I go to bed (with my other prayer). Bear in mind that I also pray in both of my two prayers that my prayer for myself is expanded to include all my friends, family, and everyone in the world. :)

Before I close, take a second to imagine if we saw everyone in our world as God does. What we ask God to act through us, to become "instruments of God's love?" What if we saw people not as humans do, but with the loving-kindness of God? We would reveal God's love to the world through our own actions and love. We would forgive people for trespassing against us not because they should or shouldn't be forgiven, but because we don't deserve mercy for trespassing against others any more or less than other people. We would treat all other people with respect because we would truly love them. We would be the change that we wished to see in the world. :)

I'll end with a quick quote I use often as part of my signature for my emails. Take it to heart:

"Do not waste time bothering whether you 'love' your neighbor, act as if you did."
-C.S. Lewis

I love my life! :)