Dear God, send me where you would best use me. Grant me a discerning ear to hear your instructions. You guide me quietly, yet I produce so much noise in my willfulness and distracted thinking. How then, dear Lord, can I better hear you?

Quiet me. Erase my will, my plans, my worries, my fantasies. Leave behind a clear lake, smooth water, a pre-dawn silence in which one or two birds call sweetly. In this quietude, let me hear and notice your whispers.

I seek escape from disturbance, yet here by this lakeside I am the one who causes upset. I stomp around, I shift loudly, even my breath has such amplitude I can scarcely hear aught else. Lord, let me cease this constant movement.

Here in the early morning, it is easy to seek peace. Now is not when it is most required. Later today, when amidst noise and calamity, let me then seek quiet. Let me recognize that this lakeside is ever here and the waters will easily become still if I only stop churning.

And then I might hear. Let me follow your quiet voice today, Lord, let me listen and follow.

(Letter #1186)

Dear God, how shall I live joyously today? I have a choice each morning. I can view the day is filled with obligations, or as with gifts. Each is true; what grows is what I focus upon.

Lord, this day is littered with your gifts. Already, at an early hour, if I look at myself rightly, I can see reasons for gratitude.

Let me be a being filled with thankfulness today. Every happening, every emotion – let me give thanks for it. Every trial, every challenge – thanks. Every interaction – thanks. Every woe — thanks.

Thank you, Lord, for this body, this day, this set of human relationships. Thank you for this way of life.

(Letter #1185)

Dear God, let me give myself to you wholly. Let me not hide my faith behind smooth and rational arguments. Let me be willing to face criticism and judgment for my dependence upon you.

The tasks you direct me to do, the surprising outcomes, even the predictable consequences – let me not try to fathom the unknowable. Let me simply be obedient. Let me listen for your call and act.

This love that you shine upon me passes all understanding. Let me devote myself to you, depend upon you, utterly.

(Letter #1184)

Dear God, am I willing, Lord, to perish? Am I willing to give and give again shortly not. Yet, Lord, you say a seed must die for new growth to come. Let me not protect myself so.

I build walls and gates, I don armor, I take up arms. All to face the trials of the world. Facing such an enemy, I am sure, eventually, to succumb and die alone.

O! Let me cease fighting and walk naked into battle. Let me smile with love at one who holds the spear, leveled at me. Sunlight will shine upon me and warm us all, calm will descend. We will lay down arms.

Someone must yield first. Let me surrender, O Lord, to every enemy – for each was sent by you. The one who brandishes weapons against me is your child, as am I.

The battlefield appears as chaos, Lord, but only from my limited vantage. I, your lamb, am here for your reasons. Let me be the love you would spread. Let me yield before all, let the contagion spread as we love and love again, spark from fellow to fellow.

I surrender, Lord, I surrender.

(Letter #1183)

Dear God, let me turn my attention toward others today. Let me help them, care for them, support them. O! I think too much of how I shall receive this or that object, of how I might organize others to provide me gratification and ease.

Let me reverse myself, Lord. Let me set about bringing ease and delight to the world, person by person.

Let me give thanks for this only: that I yet exist and thus might shine your light upon my fellows.

(Letter #1182)

Dear God, I waste so much energy wondering whether I will be up to the tasks that I face. I fear failure and inadequacy. Yet the truth is that, even in failure, you have always supported me. My fear, if I look at it honestly and with clear eyes, is that I will experience discomfort, that I will not get something I want, that I will lose something I wish to keep, or that others will judge me poorly.

Such small worries, when put in those terms. So selfish, I could not imagine speaking them aloud with any seriousness. Instead, I dress them up with careful words and offer them as prayer.

Lord, let me please see myself clearly. Let me be honest to myself about my inner life. Improve me.

(Letter #1181)

Dear God, so many souls around me that I admire. They seem so much closer to you, so much less selfish than I am, so much more kind. I keenly feel my shortcomings.

Lord, your lessons escape me at times like these. So dismayed at my own lack of progress, I can barely find you. Cares of the world crowd out my connection with you. I compete. I strive. I grasp.

Lord, take away these ruinous attitudes. They lead me away from you.

Let me move toward you, O Lord. Let me seek you. Let me depend upon you absolutely, in all the implications of such dependence. Let me turn my entire will over to you. Let my vision narrow until you are all I see.

(Letter #1180)

Dear God, let me erase myself. Let me place myself below others. Whenever I may be presented with a choice, let me choose service over self. Let me avoid praise, shun recognition.

Lord let me do all these things as practice. My tendency is toward pride and ego. I see myself as one who decides, performs, controls. Let me choose actions and attitudes that undermine my sense of self. Let me be meek, humble, retiring. Let me go last.

(Letter #1179)

Dear God, you transform me. This lump of clay, you made me into the likeness of something better. You revisit your work continually and refashion me. Characteristics that had become old, familiar friends wear away. New ones grow.

I am scarcely the same person, and this change has taken place imperceptibly. I am alien to myself when I look back. Will I later be equally different?

Lord, I give thanks for what you have made. Let me submit to you.

Remake me again.

(Letter #1178)

Dear God, let me learn simplicity. Let not my mind be so unruly, filled with thoughts and plans, list upon list.

You call me to maintain one thought at the center of all: my faith in you. My devotion to you. Instead, I am consumed with planning. Obligations. Goals. Aspirations. Fears. All trivia, set down on a list, one which I then placed upon an altar. My plans for the day become a false god and I thus become little more than a paper cup in the wind, blown from task to task, from activity to activity, a never ending stream of doing

Lord, O Lord. Still me. Teach me. Bridle me, let this bit in my mouth turn my nose to you. Walk me slowly along your pathways.

Rob me of my plans, O Lord. Burn my lists. Take away my clever scheming. Make me simple.

One thought: you. Let it burn so brightly I can think none other.

(Letter #1177)