Walking With My Brother

Thank You, Father, for being here with me this beautiful day. I want never to take You for granted, Lord, for all the beautiful days that You provide me, in Your mercy, especially this time of the year. And yet, I invariably do.

Give me, I pray, holy Lord, a spirit of perpetual thanks and gratitude for all Your tender mercies.

We are now well into the season of Thanksgiving — always one of my favorites — for the food and festivities and family, certainly, but in more recent years I feel increasing gratitude for the relative simplicity of the holiday. It’s one of spirit-filled gift-giving — gifts of gratitude for the simpler, more basic blessings of our lives and our liberty and our love for You above all and in all things.

We have been invited to share this year’s feast with our neighbors, writ broadly. Our hosts have included the woman who sold us her house several years ago. Knowing that she apologized to everyone in the neighborhood for selling her house to us, due to her perception of our political beliefs, (which she perceived to diverge from hers and supposedly theirs), I am feeling some trepidation about the whole affair, Father.

At the same time I am most of the way through a book about St Monica. She lived her life in humble service to You, Father, among people who were openly hostile to her and her beliefs. Throughout, she maintained a sweet, caring attitude of service, praying continually for each of them.

Juxaposed, these two — Thanksgiving feasts with people of largely alien beliefs, some of whom would speak harshly, judgmentally of us, and St. Monica’s life example — I am humbled by the challenge You’ve placed before me. To my likely discredit I am heartily tempted to ‘call in sick’ and avoid the whole affair.

But I also “know” that You are guiding me into this situation if I choose to follow; to help me learn how to BE: to be the person You created me to be; to be humble and kind and prayerful and loving; to be open to Your grace and to all those Christ-like qualities that are good and true…qualities that I most often forget within minutes of turning away from this writing/meditation place with You, much less by the time I’ve walked out the door and into the world.

My divinity in You, Holy Lord, is fragile. As I try to speak, my words sometimes just spew out without conforming to Your grace — a sort of ‘oral incontinence.’ Please help me, I pray, Holy Lord, to contain my words until they can find their form in You. Help me to appreciate silence and gentleness and acquiescence and to allow these three to overcome what can so easily turn into cynical, sarcastic cheap shots that might evoke a laugh or even two, but which carry no blessing.

Help me, Father, to hear the higher meanings and purposes hiding in other’s comments, so I can use these to lift us all up. Help me to hear with Your ears, Father. Help me to learn these others ways to be. Or help me to keep silent, to learn that I don’t have to speak … or even respond … even if I’m questioned. (How do people do this? How did St. Monica?) Silence is a very difficult response for me.

Only with Your help and Your grace can I learn this lesson, Father.

You’ve placed this challenge in front of me this coming week. Am I ready, do You think? Knowing is so different than doing.

Thank You Father for hearing my prayer. Please bless my way.