Prayer for Perspective

Creator and Almighty God

All good gifts come from you;

Life and breath and happiness

Each step we take anew.

You guide and you advance our way

As we walk hand in hand

With you throughout each day and night

‘Tis you who make us stand.

Provider of both great and small

Sustaining by your Word

Each aspect of creation,

Each creature and each bird.

Our senses of both sight and touch,

Of taste, of smell, of sound,

All beauty and all loveliness

Alone in you are found.

All comfort and all holiness

All grace and mercy we

Receive each morning from your hand;

Each day with constancy.

Reveal your glory – shine your light –

So we may freely see

Our need of grace – our need of faith –

To serve you willingly.

O Shepherd of the flock of Christ

Tend to your feeble sheep;

Take us to pastures lush and green,

To waters still and deep,

The valley we have entered in

Is dark and reeks of death;

Remove all trace of fear and doubt,

Revive us with your Breath.

O fix our eyes on things above

And not on things below

A beatific vision grant

Us all – and make us know

You as you are as reigning king –

Perspective give us Lord –

So we might know your will alone

Is done here and abroad.

Benevolent you are and good

And wise and merciful

All righteousness, all majesty

Resides within you still.

The tempter comes to steal and kill

And seeds of doubt to sow

But we see Jesus’s victory

O’er enemy and foe.

And so we redirect our gaze

From darkness unto light

And know within our deepest heart

That you have won the fight.

And by your Spirit, Lord, we plead

Gift us a single mind

That in the midst of hell itself

Our peace in you we’ll find.

Johann van der Bijl © 2016-04-25