a life of ministry, day 3

Come to Stillness: Take a few minutes to allow your mind and heart to be still before God.

Opening Prayer:
Dear Jesus,

     Help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go.  Flood our souls with your Spirit and life.  Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly that our lives may only be a radiance of yours.  Shine through us and so be in us that every soul we come I contact with may feel your presence in our soul.  Let them look up and see no longer us but only You.  Stay with us and then we shall begin to shine as you shine, so to shine as to be light to others.  The light, O Jesus, will be all from you.  None of it will be ours.  It will be you shining on others through us.  Let us thus praise you in the way you love best by shining on those around us.  Amen.  (The Daily Prayer of Mother Teresa)

Psalm for the Week: Psalm 145

Scripture for the Day: John 20:19-23

Reading for Reflection: 

     Transformation and intimacy both cry out for ministry.  We are led through the furnace of God's purity not just for our own sake but also for the sake of others.  We are drawn up into the bosom of God's love not merely to experience acceptance but also so we can give His love to others.

     The world writhes under the pain of its arrogance and self-sufficiency.  We can make a difference, if we will.

     In earlier days, we tried to serve out of our spiritual bankruptcy, and we failed.  We now know that ministry must flow out of abundance.

     Bernard of Clairvaux writes, "If then you are wise, you will show yourself rather as a reservoir than a canal.  For a canal spreads abroad water as it receives it, but a reservoir waits until it is filled before overflowing, and thus communicates, without loss to itself, its superabundant water.  In the Church at the present day, we have many canals, few reservoirs."  We have determined to be reservoirs. (Prayer by Richard J. Foster)

Reflection and Listening: silent and written

Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself

Song for the Week: Be Thou My Vision

 

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;

Naught be all else to me, save that thou art;

Thou my best thought, by day or by night,

Waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.

 

Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true Word;

I ever with thee and thou with me, Lord;

Thou my great Father, I thy true son,

Thou in me dwelling and I in thee one.

 

Riches I heed not, nor all empty praise;

Thou mine inheritance, now and always;

Thou and thou only, first in my heart,

High King of heaven, my treasure thou art.

 

High King of heaven, my victory won,

May I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heaven’s Sun!

Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,

Still be my vision, O Ruler of all.

 

 

Closing Prayer:

Almighty God, cause your good gifts to flow in and through my life and ministry this day and always.  Amen. (A Guide to Prayer by Rueben P. Job and Norman Shawchuck)