trust, day 5

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

Opening Prayer:
O Christ Jesus, when all is darkness and we feel our weakness and helplessness, give us the sense of your presence, your love, and your strength.  Help us to have perfect trust in your protecting love and strengthening power, so that nothing may frighten or worry us, for, living close to you, we shall see your hand, your purpose, your will through all things.

 

                                                                                   ~St. Ignatius 

Psalm for the Week: Psalm 31

Scripture for the Day: Job 42:1-6

Reading for Reflection:

The story was of a poor woman who had been carried triumphantly through a life of unusual sorrow.  She was giving the history of her life to a kind visitor on one occasion, and at the close the visitor said, feelingly, “O Hannah, I do not see how you could bear so much sorrow!” “I did not bear it,” was the quick reply; “the Lord bore it for me.” “Yes,” said the visitor “that is the right way.  You must take your troubles to the Lord.” “Yes,” replied Hannah, “but we must do more than that; we must leave them there.  Most people,” she continued, “take their burdens to Him, but they bring them away with them again, and are just as worried and unhappy as ever.  But I take mine, and I leave them with Him, and come away and forget them.  And if the worry comes back, I take it to Him again; I do this over and over, until at last I just forget that I have any worries, and am at perfect rest.” (The Christian’s Secret of a Happy Life by Hannah Whitall Smith) 

Reflection and Listening: silent and written

Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself

Song for the Week: Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus

Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus,
Just to take Him at His word;
Just to rest upon His promise,
Just to know “Thus saith the Lord!”
 
Chorus:
Jesus, Jesus, how I trust Him!
How I’ve proved Him o’er and o’er
Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus!
O for grace to trust Him more!
 
O how sweet to trust in Jesus,
Just to trust His cleansing blood;
Just in simple faith to plunge me
’Neath the healing, cleansing flood!
 
Yes ’tis sweet to trust in Jesus,
Just from sin and self to cease;
Just from Jesus simply taking
Life and rest, and joy and peace.
 
I’m so glad I learned to trust Thee,
Precious Jesus, Savior, friend;
And I know that Thou art with me,
Wilt be with me to the end.


Closing Prayer:
But I trust in you, O Lord, I say, “You are my God.”  My times are in your hands.  Amen. (Psalm 31:14-15)