Orders of the Day

Letter 4496

What are the orders of the day?

Do good. Speak truth. Seek humility.

Seek to do your will.

Such a simple call — such a difficult task at times.

Do you reward the trying or the doing?

Let me seek your face, that I may better do your will.


Consider:

Can I seek your face today?


Reading:

❖ “It is not enough to know, we must also apply; it is not enough to will, we must also do.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Maxims and Reflections

❖ “The spiritual life is not a special career, involving abstraction from the world of things.” — Evelyn Underhill, Practical Mysticism

❖ “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” — Micah 6:8 (KJV)


Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

The Rules

Letter 4495

What are the rules, O Lord?

Try my best.

Help others.

Order my thoughts.

Lean towards you.


Consider:

Can I follow the rules today?


Reading:

❖ “What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.” — Confucius, Analects 15:23

❖ “Love, and do what thou wilt.” — Augustine, Homilies on the First Epistle of John

❖ “Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.” — Ecclesiastes 12:13 (KJV)


Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Crystal Ball

Letter 4494

I had plans upon awakening, in the dark of morning.

Tidy rooms, sweep stoop, weed garden. A full morning.

Yet had arrived a message overnight. I was needed. I set out at dawn.

I was so certain, as I retired the night before, of what I would be doing.


Consider:

Can I accept the unknown of each day?


Reading:

❖ “The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men / Gang aft agley.” — Robert Burns, To a Mouse

❖ “My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.” — Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

❖ “Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.” — Proverbs 27:1 (KJV)


Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Disarray

Letter 4493

I am to go on a journey today, yet I have found my dwelling in disarray. Something broke overnight.

Shall I walk on, knowing of the disrepair awaiting my return?

Shall I delay, and stay to remedy the broken system?

I did not anticipate this choice.

Lord, let me stop, and try to discern your will at each fork in the road.


Consider:

Can I listen for your will?


Reading:

❖ “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart.” — Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

❖ “Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see / The distant scene; one step enough for me.” — John Henry Newman, Lead, Kindly Light

❖ “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.” — Psalm 32:8 (KJV)


Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.