Faith: Prayer of Rupert Meyer

I found this prayer while reading FB wall posts and updates. Just wanted to share it here.

PRAYER OF RUPERT MEYER

Lord, what You will let it be so

Where You will there we will go

What is Your will help us to know

Lord, when You will the time is right

In You there's joy in strife

For Your will I'll give my life

To ease Your burden brings no pain

To forego all for You is gain

As long as I in You remain

Because You will it, it is best

Because You will it, we are blest

Till in Your hands our hearts find rest

Till in Your hands our hearts find rest

Faith: Disturbing the Already Disturbed

This morning, I attended the Pasig Feast. During Bro. Obet's talk, they flashed a prayer, and we were asked to read parts of it. The prayer was "Disturb us, O Lord."

I've encountered the prayer before. And while I was reading it aloud together with the other attendees, I somehow stopped and stared at the lines. My friend, who was sitting beside me, I realized, also stopped reading. Then we both laughed.

As it is, our lives are already disturbed. Actually, we don't know if we want more disturbances right now. Haha!

But I still posted parts of it on my Facebook account. And I am writing about it here. Because some lines struck me:

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,

To venture on wilder seas

Where storms will show Your mastery...

I just thought I'd hang on to my edited Prayer No. 1. I don't understand why things happened the way they did, and whether there's even a purpose for it. But maybe, just maybe, it's one of those few things with a purpose indeed, and it will unfold in time.

I'm hanging on to hope. Sana it is granted. Not just for me and my siblings. Above all, it's for my parents. Mataray man ako at matigas ang ulo, love ko sila. I am praying for their happiness, for the best that life can still offer them.

I know at a certain point, I need to let go and let God. I can't keep telling God what to do. I just need to ask, and now that I have, to just trust Him. Argh. This is difficult to someone like me who wants to be in control of things. Grrr.

Pero fine. I'm trying. Really. I mean I will try, starting tonight.

Below is the complete text of the prayer. (Copied from http://churchedge.blogspot.com/2007/11/disturb-us-o-lord.html)

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
with the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wilder seas
Where storms will show Your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask you to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push back the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

This we ask in the name of our Captain,
Who is Jesus Christ.

Sir Francis Drake

Prayers: Serenity Prayer

Another one of my favorite prayers....

The Serenity Prayer

God, grant us the
Serenity to accept things we cannot change,
Courage to change the things we can, and the
Wisdom to know the difference
Patience for the things that take time
Appreciation for all that we have, and
Tolerance for those with different struggles
Freedom to live beyond the limitations of our past ways, the
Ability to feel your love for us and our love for each other and the
Strength to get up and try again even when we feel it is hopeless.

- attributed to Reinhold Niebuhr

Prayers: Fall in Love (attributed to Fr. Arrupe, S.J.

Fall in Love

Attributed to Fr. Pedro Arrupe, SJ (1907–1991)

Nothing is more practical than
finding God, than
falling in Love
in a quite absolute, final way.
What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.
It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read, whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.
Fall in Love, stay in love,
and it will decide everything.

Prayers: A Prayer by Thomas Merton

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going,
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.

Nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.

But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.

I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.


- in Thoughts in Solitude by Thomas Merton

Spiritual Workout Day 3: Following Him

Among the verses for Day 3, the one that touched me most was:

"Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be." (John 12: 26)

And I do not have much of a reflection. Only that following Him is usually difficult. At times you don't understand why something is not allowed. At times you have to go against what everyone is doing or believes to be right. At times you just feel like rebelling against the rules.

I just have one short prayer. For faith, that we may believe and obey though we do not always understand. For guidance, on those times when we couldn't figure out what we should do. For strength, to be able to do what should be done. For a capacity to forgive, others and ourselves, for the shortcomings. And when we falter, the wisdom to learn from our mistakes and stand up and start again. Amen.