Jesus Christ: he has given us the most glorious interpretation of life's meaning that the sons of men have ever had. The fatherhood of God, the friendship of the Spirit, the sovereignty of righteousness, the law of love, the glory of service, the coming of the Kingdom, the eternal hope--there never was an interpretation of life to compare with that. If life often looks as though his interpretation were too good to be true, we need not be surprised. Few things in the universe are as superficially they look. The earth looks flat and, as long as we gaze on it, it never will look any other way, but it is spherical for all that. The earth looks stationary and if we live to be as old as Methuselah we never will see it move, but it is moving--seventy-five times faster than a cannon ball! The sun looks as though it rose in the east and set in the west, and we never can make it look any other way, but it does not rise nor set at all. So far as this earth is concerned, the sun is standing still enough. We look as though we walked with our heads up and our feet down, and we never can make ourselves look otherwise, but someone finding a safe stance outside this whirling sphere would see us half the time walking with our heads down and our feet up. Few things are ever the way they look, and the end of all scientific research, as of all spiritual insight, is to get behind the way things look to the way things are. Walter Pater has a rememberable phrase, "the hiddenness of perfect things." One meaning, therefore, which Christ has for Christians lies in the realm of spiritual interpretation. He has done for us there what Copernicus and Galileo did in astronomy: he has moved us out from our flat earth into his meaningful universe, full of moral worth and hope.
From Christianity and Progress, by Harry Emerson Fosdick
What Christ has done for us
Prayer for Spiritual Healing
My Lord, there are so many unsaid prayers in my heart. But you can hear beyond words and understand beyond phrases. You can read our most intimate thoughts and see our deepest fears and desires. Let us not be overwhelmed by them. Let us not be tormented by the things we cannot put into words. Look beyond the surface and heal our hidden wounds. For you alone have unconstrained access to those places. You understand the cause and the effect and the source of all our problems and concerns. Clear the dark corners of our being and bring sunshine into each and every one of them.
AMEN
Prayer for Comfort and Guidance
AMEN
A Prospect of Heaven
By C. M. Watts
There is a land of pure delight,
Where saints immortal reign;
Eternal day excludes the night,
And pleasures banish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-withering flowers:
Death, like a narrow sea, divides
This heavenly land from ours.
Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood
Stand dressed in living green:
So to the Jews old Canaan stood,
And Jordan rolled between.
O could we make our doubts remove,--
Those gloomy doubts that rise,--
And see the Canaan that we love
With unbeclouded eyes.
Could we but climb where Moses stood,
And view the landscape o'er,--
Not Jordan's stream, nor death's cold flood,
Should fright us from the shore.
Taken from Hymns for Christian Devotion, by J.G. Adams and E.H. Chapin
Prayers for Children (and not only)
Jesus, help my eyes to see
All the good Thou sendest me.
Jesus, help my ears to hear
Calls for help from far and near.
Jesus, help my feet to go
In the way that Thou wilt show.
Jesus, help my hands to do
All things loving, kind, and true.
Jesus, may I helpful be,
Growing every day like Thee. Amen.
Now I awake and see the light;
Lord, Thou hast kept me through the night.
To Thee I lift my voice and pray
That Thou wilt keep me through the day.
If I should die before 'tis done,
O God, accept me through Thy Son! Amen.
At the close of every day,
Lord, to Thee I kneel and pray.
Look upon Thy little child,
Look in love and mercy mild.
O forgive and wash away
All my naughtiness this day,
And both when I sleep and wake
Bless me for my Savior's sake. Amen.
O Thou, from whom all blessings flow,
I lift my heart to Thee;
In all my sorrows, conflicts, woes,
Dear Lord, remember me. Amen.
Lord, gracious God, I cry to Thee,
Still bless me with Thy favor,
Forgive my sins, and let me live,
Thy child remain forever.
Thou hast redeemed me with Thy blood,
Thou art my only Trust and God
In every need, my Savior. Amen.
Almighty God, Thy Word is cast
Like seed into the ground;
Now let the dew of heaven descend
And righteous fruits abound. Amen.
My God, accept my heart this day
And make it always Thine,
That I from Thee no more may stray,
No more from Thee decline.
Anoint me with Thy heavenly grace,
Adopt me for Thine own,
That I may see Thy glorious face
And worship at Thy throne.
Let every thought and work and word
To Thee be ever given;
Then life shall be Thy service, Lord,
And death the gate of heaven. Amen.
Dismiss us with Thy blessing, Lord;
Help us to feed upon Thy Word;
All that has been amiss forgive
And let Thy truth within us live. Amen.
Taken from the collection "Little Folded Hands - Prayers for Children"
