Category Archives: prayer

when the baby has enough.

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A hungry baby is a terrible thing.

First comes whimpering. Then crying. Then a screaming that consumes the child’s whole body. Long before danger of starvation, the child makes sure that there is no one within earshot that has any question about a need for food. That same child, a bottle or a breast later, is content. No tears, no cries, no struggles, no fears.

That’s the image a writer uses to describe a soul in Psalm 131. Instead of worrying, of crying out about “things too great and marvelous for me”, the writer has

calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.

We can go two directions at this point. We could move quickly to talk about those infants who have no food. Those infants who, no matter how loud the crying, will never be satisfied. Adrift in crowds in Somalia, they will die before they have the food they need.

Or we can look at the condition of our souls.

It is easy for me to allow my soul to be consumed with things I cannot understand, that I cannot resolve. International and internal politics. How everything will be tied together, or will fall apart. Being in charge. Things that they have no direct connect to that I watch friends lose sleep over.

Instead, the psalmist suggests,

O Israel, hope in the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore.

Intriguingly, when my soul is content at the side of a loving God, frenetic activity is replaced with thoughtful observation. I quit trying to fix. I quit being God. I can see around me. I notice suffering. And it is possible to climb from the lap and offer hope. Especially to the child crying from physical starvation.

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My friend Rich Dixon is still riding the length of the Mississippi on his hand cycle, raising money for Convoy of Hope. He’s ridden 1000 miles so far. It’s one way to help kids.  (Rich and I)

more than watchmen waiting.

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You are waiting.

You aren’t sure what’s happening. You can’t see to the end of today. And you are waiting.

It reminds you of that summer before your senior year of high school, the summer that you worked third shift. All alone in the building, all alone working on the computer.  Sometimes alone is okay. But in the hours just before dawn, when exhaustion is setting in, you can see waiting.

It reminds you of the time between you decided to apply for the job and the conversation in your office when they said, “We’ve decided to go the other direction.” Those weeks of wondering, those last minutes of sheer uncertainty about which way your whole life was going.

You are waiting.

And in your waiting, you are trying to talk to God. You make promises and then rescind them and then rescind your doubt and then doubt yourself. It’s so deep, your waiting, that some moments you cannot breath. You cannot sit. You cannot touch the keyboard.

An ancient chant starts playing around the edges of your heart.

More than the watchmen, waiting for the morning.
More than the watchmen, waiting for the morning.

Every bit of urgency and despair and desire and fear pours itself into that line. Because that’s how much you want hope, how much you are aching for this to be fixed.  But you can’t remember where that chant came from.

It came from Psalm 130, which is familiar even if never before seen.  Right before the repeated watchman phrase, the writer tells us the object of desire:

My soul waits for the Lord
More than the watchmen, waiting for the morning.

You aren’t the first to wait.  Or the first to cry out from the depths for mercy. I’ve known the feeling. And found hope.

Waiting is hard. Really.

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(first published October 19, 2010)

I wrote to a friend yesterday. I said,

“Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.”

It wasn’t very original. It was the end of a prayer that David wrote (Psalm 27). But it’s what came across my desk yesterday and I passed it on to him.

“Waiting. That’s a really tricky one for me.” That’s how he replied.

I understand. Waiting is really hard.

  • When it’s Christmas and you know there must be something amazing and you want to find out what it is, waiting is hard.
  • When it’s report card day and you are pretty sure it isn’t going to be something amazing and you are wondering what your parents are going to say, waiting is hard.
  • When there are a million seeds in the field, when those million seeds represent everything you own, and there is a race between the seeds sprouting and drought and storms and seeds ripening and the combine working and the market  falling, waiting is excruciating.
  • When the enemies of your soul are all around your house and it is the early hours of the morning and you cannot sleep, waiting is hard.

As a professional worrier, I understand.

In the middle of that prayer, David talks about how he talks to himself:

My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
Your face, LORD, I will seek.

David’s heart, the voice inside that is feeling the pressure, the despair, the stress of everything, wants hope. It longs for something other than the current uncertainty. And that voice says, “Stop trying to figure it all out. Just look for His face.”

David looks.

When at the end of the prayer he talks of waiting, he’s assuring his heart (“take heart”). It’s a “just wait. You’ll see” kind of wait.

On praying, part 8,397.

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I sent words from Proverbs to a friend.

Humans are satisfied with whatever looks good;
God probes for what is good.
Put God in charge of your work,
then what you’ve planned will take place.

My friend said, “But how?”

Here’s part of what I said:

We create plans all the time, plans that don’t work.

They don’t work because they center around us and our own view of reality. They run aground because other people exist. We cannot control other people. (We can barely control ourselves).

For example:

You make a plan. Your spouse exists. And her very uttering of anything can affect whether that plan happens.

We think, “If only I could have a bigger view, process more variables, be able to read people better, talk better, explain better.”

Then we think, “What if someone could see the interplay of everyone. See the end from the beginning.  Suggest which path might be better, which way of living might be best.”

And God, assuming that he is who he says he is, is that someone.

But with God, the starting point isn’t that I plan and then say, “Hey God. Make this work.” Or even “Please please please make this work and I’ll be indebted to you forever.”

The starting point is, “So, God, you know where you want me to end up. Even better, HOW you want me to end up. You know the kind of person that you want me to be so that, at the end, I’m more like you. Today I need your direction. About this decision, I need your direction. More importantly, I need to know the values you are using, God, so that I use those as my values so that I end up with the choices you’d make.”

And then never say “amen.”

renewing habits – 6 am

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Four years ago this month, I started setting my alarm for 6 am. At the time, I needed to build a habit intentionally, almost any habit it seemed. Since then, the alarm has been set for 6 am most mornings. And now my body is set for 6.

Back then, I had a plan for that hour. Fifteen minutes of praying, fifteen minutes of reading, fifteen minutes of catching up with online, fifteen minutes of writing (a series of posts on signs for that first month.)

As I think about the four years since then, much has changed in our lives. And I’ve discovered that I can add habits a little better than I used to be able to. (You are reading one of those habits right now).

But I’m also looking at this particular habit and discovering…

Habits sometimes need to be reviewed. I’ve clung to the 6 am habit. I’m still consistent with the social media part of it. But I have to be honest that the other three quarters of that hour aren’t nearly as consistent. Going back to the original intent of the habit is helpful.

Habits sometimes need to be renewed. Having seen where I’ve not been consistent, it’s time to renew the commitment, to look for ways to restore the balance. Not because it’s more spiritual to pray and read the Bible than look online. However, the plan was a good one. It was healthy. And I need the consistency of morning quiet and reflection.

Habits sometimes need to be refused. Some mornings the habit is to get up at six and stare at the screen. Those mornings, I would be better served by laying on the downstairs sofa and catching an extra hour of sleep. Because the beneficial habit isn’t just 6. It’s the content of the hour.

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This is the second of a series of posts on 6. The first was Psalm 6.