For what or whom are you most grateful? Least grateful?

Father, your gifts are boundless and my thanks can never express the great thankfulness that fills my heart. There is nothing in my power, not even my life, that can repay what you have given. Everything I am and everything I have is yours, and any service or worship I offer is just a piece of what is due.

Today I am most thankful for those other people you've put into this world before me that I look to for inspiration, learning, and emulation. From the early church fathers like St. Augustine and all the communion of saints before and after him, thanks to them all, I have a beautiful understanding of what it means to be Christian, and to truely follow your son. From the great scholars and philosophers of history, whether aware of your majesty or not, their gifts granted by you help us all every day and give us a richer experience in this world for it. And especially those people in my life even now who demonstrate such a pure desire to follow you, to love you, to love those around them, and to share that lifestyle with me, they are my modern day saints. For them most of all, I thank you, Lord.

AMEN.

While He was on the way to Jerusalem, He was passing between Samaria and Galilee. As He entered a village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met Him; and they raised their voices, saying, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!" When He saw them, He said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests." And as they were going, they were cleansed. Now one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, and he fell on his face at His feet, giving thanks to Him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus answered and said, "Were there not ten cleansed? But the nine-where are they? "Was no one found who returned to give glory to God, except this foreigner?" And He said to him, "Stand up and go; your faith has made you well."
    → Luke 17:11-19

Thank the Lord for 10 benefits you have been given.

Lord, I want to thank you for all the gifts you have given me in my short life already. The endless blessings you bestow are only a glimpse into the true boundless love you have for all of us. May my life give you some small pleasure in return. These are a few of the things I am most thankful for:

• The little suffering in my life.
• A loving family.
• Wonderful, caring friendships.
• The opportunity to grow and learn in a place where I was free to choose to listen to your call.
• Your call.
• I'm learning to let go of my pride.
• I'm free to travel and explore.
• The skills and ability to survive are mine.
• I am healthy and well cared for.
• You've given me a great curiosity and methods to fill it.

For these things and the endless other gifts you have given me, I thank you with all my heart.

AMEN.

At this point, go back over the last two weeks of prayer. What commitments do you make?

Go back over the whole month of your prayers. What was good? Not so good? Will you continue?

Lord, I've been away for a while now, if not in prayer, than at least in this prayer blog. I let the rigors of my day to day life take precidence in an unhealthy way. I want to ask your forgiveness for falling to the temptations of a life where work is my greatest concern. I know my relationship to you is the most important thing, but sometimes I stray.

Thinking back over the previous month of prayer, before the break, I think this has been one of the more productive times of my life not just in a worldly sense, but in my growth in respect to you, Lord. I feel closer to you, able to talk without stuttering, and share my fears and hopes. I really hope that getting back into the daily prayer will bring more and more to my life and understanding of my place in your plan.

AMEN.

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
    → Romans 12:2

Lord, the lessons I've been praying about this week talk of conformity to your will versus conformity to the world. You've put all of this around us for a reason. We are not babies in a playpen to find our selfish amusement in these things, but you do give us the opportunity for happiness here. Even the poorest, starving child can find happiness in her short life thanks to you, but the real lesson I was supposed to learn was not to pity that child. She is the one closest to salvation, the meek, the poor, the destitute. Her life will be much more difficult for her body, but in all my worldly comforts, my path to you will be much more difficult for my soul. And that is where the truth lies for me. I have the means to help her body and she has the means to help my soul.

Whenever I can quiet my mind and listen to you there is some new wisdom you whisper to me. You know the questions of my heart, even when I can't put them into words. For a while now, I've been wondering what it was about helping the poor that makes it such a holy endeavor in your name. Though I didn't know how to ask, you found a way to answer.

Father, I don't have words for my love for you, but I know you can feel it and know it, just as you know my questions. Thank you for putting my heart at ease.

AMEN.

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
    → Romans 8:38-39

Paul is convinced that no creature can separate us from the love of God. What do you say about that? Name some creatures that could.

Lord, I sincerely believe that your love for us is boundless. Whether we are priests or murderers, when we drop down on our knees and pray for true forgiveness, you are always there to welcome us back to you. So the idea that any creature of your creation could come between that love is absurd. However, our love of you is not so pure or infinite.

We are weak, tempted by the fruit of every tree, and painfully prideful. It's not hard for us to lose our way. I think that in our hearts, we all want to know you. Some may find that path easier than others, though. Lord, let your grace fill up those lives who have wandered away so that they can find their way home.

There is only one creature capable of cutting us off from your love: us. You gave us a powerful gift of free will, but it horrifies me to see so many of us taking it up as a standard of freedom from responsibility. We were given a choice to believe or not. That unique gift you've given us is the ability to cut ourselves off, to turn away and ignore you, and though we are never truely alone - as you still watch us and give us strength - we are seperated in our hearts.

I know that not everyone will be saved by your love even if I don't understand why. It confuses me at times and gives me a deep sadness. I trust in your infinite goodness that it is the right way, though, and that gives me some relief.

AMEN.

What does Jesus think of strength, death, life after death, failure, poverty? Do you agree?

Lord, as creatures of your creation, our purpose is, above all, to worship and honor you. Everything else you have created for us is like a tool to be used for that purpose. Indeed, even this life you have given me is just a tool that I should be using to find you, honor your glory, and to worship you, so that after this brief life I will be in your presence for eternity.

But as a creature, I've fallen into the rut of living for the things of this life. The temporary goals, like long-life, strength, money, success, these have such a tempting call that is difficult to label as wrong. I've been raised to believe that money makes this life easier, and even if I try to temper my goals by saying, "I don't need a lot of money, just enough to sustain my life comfortably," I am in fact failing in a much more subtle way. It's this type of justified sin that takes me further from you, Lord.

Because I know that my comfort in this life is not what brings me closer to you. In fact, when I am comfortable, my thoughts are much more likely to wander to other things that distract me from my purpose. And so, when I think of what Jesus would think of these ideas, they're all put into perspective in remembering that everything of this life is temporary.

Jesus loved his friends and family and his short time on Earth, and that gives me a great comfort that the value of this place is not nothing; however, his first priority was always love of you. He worked his craft for thirty years, providing for his family, which also gives me strength that making "any" money isn't wrong. It is the distinction of money as a value object that brings the sin. To value it above your purpose and to think that it is what sustains my life is blind and arrogant.

I think true strength is the ability to ask for the hardships and rocky roads that keep a person focused on you. In that path, death isn't to be feared. Life after death is the true goal, as it leads to you. Failure and poverty are just two states of being in this life. If they help a person discern their path to you, then they should be embraced. If they hurt those around us, it is our purpose to help them. If they keep us from our faith then we should toil endlessly to overcome them. Everything in itself is a tool given to us by you, for you.

Lord, I thank you for the various paths you've given us all towards our own salvation. Please remember me and those I love at judgement day.

AMEN.

What does Jesus think of separation from family and friends, healing, love of family and friends, courage? Do you agree?

Lord, when I read the gospels, I try to understand Jesus as a person. Who better to emulate in this human existance than you, yourself. There can't be a better example of what it means to live rightly.

So when I think of how Jesus spent time with his family, I try to take lessons from that in the same way I take lessons from everything else he did. He honored Mary and spent time with her. He honored his earthly father as well. But above all he honored you, Lord, as his true father in heaven. When the time came for him to serve you, he did what was he was called to do, though it might take him far away from his family. His love for them continued, and indeed, he still spent time with them in those short years of his ministry.

In listening to my own discernment, I know that I am called to travel far. I will probably be out-of-touch with my own friends and family at times while doing your work. I've learned the importance of that contact, though, and while I am here in Georgia, perhaps far away from certain friends and family, I do my best to keep in touch with them, and spend time in each others company, even if it can only happen over the phone or while playing a computer game. Our relationships in this world matter, even if not so much as our relationship with you. I try my best to keep them faithfully in whatever ways I can.

AMEN.

Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.
    → Philippians 4:8

Are you willing to choose what helps most to your salvation? Are you willing to do what Paul says in Philippians 4:8 ?

Lord, I've spent a lot of my time here doing things I shouldn't have been doing. I took pleasure in the world, thinking that was what life was about. I turned away from you and brought dark things into my life. I know first hand what effect our thoughts have on our being.

These days, I am trying very hard to fill my life with right thoughts, to be truly dedicated to seeking a greater communion with you and living by Jesus' words. When I accept these good things, embrace them, live them, and fill my life with them, I feel your presence close by and I know that this is the happiness spoken of in the scriptures. I am still tempted by those other things from my past and at times I fail to turn away from them still, but each day I spend with you I grow stronger in will and in faith.

I am willing to do these things for my own salvation and I hope that I influence others to do the same. Thinking of honorable things and living right isn't a sacrifice. It makes me happy. For that, I thank you, Lord.

AMEN.

And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ; having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
    → Philippians 1:9-11

Can you value pain, suffering, violence, illness? Does Jesus value them? Explain.

Lord, forgive me my sins and the suffering I have caused you and others. You gave us a great blessing in the Holy Spirit and called us to a great purpose. Give me the strength to fulfill your desires for me.

Sometimes the pain and suffering in the world gets to me, Father. I see the terrible atrocities in Myanmar or hear of the earthquakes in China, the stories of violence in this country or the food shortages world-wide and I cringe. There was a time when these things made me think, "why?" In my time, I've come to some basic understanding of the need for suffering in the world. I've accepted, if reluctantly, but pain is pain. It causes me to feel this way, to empathise with those suffering, just as I empathise with Jesus on the cross. I don't want to see suffering in any person's life, but I know it must happen, just as I know I'll be made to suffer too one day.

You have asked a lot of your people, Father, but not even a fraction of what you have offered us. How could pain give me any doubts of your plan for us when you sent your son here to suffer and die for us? I've felt the healing power in suffering, and I've felt the dispair as well. Pain makes us cry out to you, to ask why we are being punished, but inside we know that's not what's happening. We like to think of your works on our scale. It helps us to feel we have some manner of control in the world, but there is a great difference between free will and control of the world. You gave me the power to choose to follow you freely, but I don't have the power to keep my body from aging, from dying, from suffering. I will grow old, or perhaps die tomorrow and it doesn't matter. Your works are not on our scale, not on par with a human life. Your works are infinite, majestic, numinous.

Suffering brings us physical pain. Sometimes it brings us emotional pain or mental anguish. All of these things are temporary, though. They are of this tiny world, nearly insignificant, just a blip on the great scale of time. Our life with you, which comes after, will stretch on in ad finitum without the suffering a profane existance brings. I pray that the pains I will bear in this world will help prepare my soul, teach me the power of love and charity, and bring me closer to you.

So, Father, let my own sins be washed away and grant me the opportunity to help those in pain, to ease their suffering in this world, and give all of us the clarity of mind and heart to listen to your call. I ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, your only son.

AMEN.

Paul says you should "value the things that really matter -- up to the very day of Christ." Do you? Do you want to?

Lord, I've certainly had my priorities backwards for a very long time. Even now, in the midst of this transformation, I'm tempted to my old ways. It's so easy to see the opportunities for worldly gain and happiness, but I know now that these things aren't what really matters. In a way, that path has been ruined. I can't choose the simple pleasures because they won't bring me lasting happiness. I've heard your message and I know what you ask of me. This discernment has made it clear that I can't go back.

So, Lord, I pray that I'll find the strength to continue to the very end in service to 'things that really matter,' wherever that may take me. Let your will be done on Earth, and give me the strength to be the doer of these things.

AMEN.