Prayer – Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Sunday Walk 21

I started reading David Pawson’s Practicing the Principles of Prayer this past week. I am beginning to understand prayer as a human privilege. Since prayer is a conversation, it is also never done alone. In order to bring that point home, I keep reminding myself to vocalize my prayers with words, not just thoughts, even if I speak only in a whisper.

I suspect I’ve thought of prayer too often as some sort of mindless, staring-at-my-navel meditation. That, I see now, is done alone and it is not as valuable as I once thought. It has been an awakening for me to get past that. By awakening I don’t mean that “woke” stuff where sleep-walkers bend a knee to the idol-of-the-day, but a real awakening.

Washington Prayer March 2020

Today is the Washington Prayer March, The Return. Psalm 51 is a psalm David wrote after being exposed by Nathan for his relationship with Bathsheba. Many verses are memorable especially verse 10 (12 in the Tehillim) where David asks God to create in him a clean heart, something only God can do.

לֵ֣ב טָ֭הוֹר בְּרָא־לִ֣י אֱלֹהִ֑ים וְר֥וּחַ נָ֝כ֗וֹן חַדֵּ֥שׁ בְּקִרְבִּֽי׃
Tehillim 51:12 Sefaria

Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
Psalms 51:10 King James Version

Be part of The Return with this live video presentation and/or listen to Christene Jackman’s Choneni Elohim below.

Lyrics by King David, music by Christene Jackman: Choneni Elohim

Making a Difference

If asked to speak I don’t know what to say.
Words appear and then refuse to be.
Mumbling nonsense I can’t clearly see
How dots from here to there could find their way.
Even so those dots begin to play
And laugh as they enjoy confounding me
And jeer when I pretend some honesty,
But nonetheless I’ll risk these words and pray:

  Make a difference. Show us something new.
  Judge us with Your mercy.  May we ask
  For wisdom so we'll see the pointing sign?
  Lead us so that we may more align
  With what You know is now our better task
  And not what we might like to see come true.

Linked to dVerse Meeting the Bar. I am hosting today. The theme is to write a poem with fourteen lines. There’s no other constraint. I used a Petrarchan sonnet here, but no form is required. Come and join us with a poem of your own.

I heard earlier this week that the first Thursday in May is the National Day of Prayer in the United States. This has been happening on some day in the US since 1952. With our health and our economy at risk, I’m offering this sonnet as a prayer. Hopefully I am not offending the God who makes a difference with what I’ve said.