made in his image, day 2

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

Opening Prayer:
Blessed are you, God of all creation.  Let us who are made in your image and are sustained by your hand reflect you in all that we do, that in all things you may be glorified, forever and ever.  Amen.  (Work of God)


Psalm for the Week: Psalm 139

Scripture for the Day: Romans 8:18-27

Reading for Reflection:

These days when someone commits an atrocity, we tend to sigh and say, “That’s human nature.”  But our attitude would seem wrong-headed to the desert monks, who understood human beings to be part of the creation that God called good, special in that they are made in the image of God.  Sin, then, is an aberration, not natural to us at all.  This is why Gregory of Nyssa speaks so often of “returning to the grace of that image which was established in you from the beginning.”  Gregory, in fact, saw it as our lifelong task to find out what part of the divine image God has chosen to reveal in us.  Like the other early monks, he suggests that we can best do this by realistically determining how God has made us—what our primary faults and temptations are, as well as our gifts—not that we might better “know ourselves,” or in modern parlance, “feel good about ourselves,” but in order that we might become instruments of divine grace for other people. (The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris)

Reflection and Listening: silent and written

Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself

Song for the Week: I Have a Maker

 

 

I have a Maker,

He formed my heart

Before even time began
My life was in His hands

He knows my name,
He knows my every thought
He sees each tear that falls
And hears me when I call

I have a Father,
He calls me His own
He’ll never leave me
no matter where I go

Closing Prayer: 
Loving Creator, I have no quarrel with the way you have so carefully designed me in your image.  Truly I am your work of art.  Take me deeper today.  Show me my virtues—the wonders of your design for my life.  Help me not to be afraid to look into the depths of myself and believe in what I see—for I am the work of your hands.  If I can believe in what I see, then I can rejoice in what I see.  Precious in your sight, I am your work of art. Continue to create me in your image.  Amen. (Behold Your Life by Macrina Wiederkehr)