An Old Prayer

An old prayer

This wonderful prayer causes us to regard ourselves, our visions, desires, and our lack of Godly ambition. I read this and I am forced to reconsider my own walk with God even if only, but not just, because I want to understand the implications of all that I am praying.

Disturb Us, O Lord

when we are too well-pleased with ourselves,

when our dreams have come true because we dreamed too little,

because we sailed too close to the shore.

Our God is a big God – He is vast but we dream little dreams; we aspire to small goals; we hardly ever get out of our own comfort zone. As a result, we get satisfied with the very little we’ve asked for and we get far too pleased, even smug, with our limited achievements. We limit what we can achieve by our own limited view of our limitless God.

Disturb Us, O Lord

when with the abundance of things we possess

we have lost our thirst for the water of life,

when having fallen in love with time,

we have ceased to dream of eternity

and in our efforts to build a new earth,

we have allowed our vision of Heaven to grow dim.

Because our dreams and visions are so small, we are satisfied with the “success” we have in our career and possessions and we think we have “arrived” thus deluding ourselves out of any thirst for the limitless supply of life- giving water that flows from within us via Holy Spirit. We are so concerned with the tick of the clock and the passing of our days, and all that fills them, that we lose sight and any concept of eternity. Our ambition dies with each successful dream or vision and we cease to dream of bigger and better things. We limit God in His efforts to inspire us further and higher. Our ‘hinds feet’ get stuck in the success of ‘now’ rather than seeking the higher places. There is always a higher place to go and the higher you can go the further you can see.

Stir Us, O Lord,

to dare more boldly, to venture into wider seas

where storms show thy mastery,

where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.

When we continue to seek God; continue to receive the dreams and visions He has for us, then we may actually dare to go further; to step right out of our comfort zones while trusting Him to keep us safe. Sure it’s a big bad world out there. Certainly there are powerful storms waiting to pounce on us but where God is also waiting to take us safely through. Without a doubt, there are places to go; people to meet and serve with the Gospel where we will feel the exaggerated awareness of the difficulty of rescue – even the complete lack of such a service. Yet it is there that God meets us and cares for us because we trust Him to do so. That is when we will gasp in amazement at the size and power of our God. That is when we will be lost in admiration, adoration, and praise. That is when we will be able, without reservation, to give Him all the Glory.

In the name of him who pushed back the horizons of our hopes and invited the brave to follow.

Amen

Why do you not allow Him to do just this. I like the phrase, “push back the horizons of our hopes”, it is so fitting for those who have done so in the past and those who will do so in the future. These few brave soldiers for God allow Him, nay invite Him to push back the horizons of their hopes.

Are you one of them too, I wonder?