Ever Present Lord,
Please be with me as I write and pray today.
I really love this passage. Something which stuck out to me today, and didn't the first time I prayed this passage were verses 17 and 18:
To me how precious your thoughts, O God; how great is the sum of them! If I count them, they are more than the sand; at the end, I am still at your side.
To me they stuck out to me as odd. They seemed to not fit the rest of the passage. The rest of the pass had a lot to do with You being everywhere I could be, whether real or metaphorical. Weather physical or spiritual. I then asked You what You wanted me to know from these two verses, if anything, and you answered within moments.
I think these verses signify two different things. They signify Your presence through time. Even after I've completed the infinite task of counting Your thoughts, you're still with me. The other is my infinite value in Your eyes. Even though Your thoughts are infinite and huge, I am still very much a focus for You. I am valuable to You. In the midst of your infinitude, and the seeming infinitude of Your creation, I still have Your gaze, Your attention, and Your care.
It's funny, but not I guess, that this stuck out today considering that the exercises calls for me to consider how I experience Your personal love and care for me in my daily life. In daily life Your grace and love keep me afloat. The invisible force of your love is what keeps everything from disintegrating into lifeless, meaningless particles. Your love does not violate my free will by moving my hands, but it creates my hands, sustains their existence, and provides something for them to work toward. It creates and sustains a larger physical reality, with laws and with physical and human representations of Your own perfectness which we are to engage in in order that we might come into contact with You here on earth, and be affected by Your grace that we may enter into eternal communion with Your, our Loving and Ever Present Creator.
Lord, you've given me the gift of suffering. Much of my life has been deeply painful, and has wounded me in profound ways. Without Your grace these wounds tend to embitter me. Even still I tend toward that outcome, and evens still the tone of my speech prefers that direction. My heart feels lighter and more lovely than ever, but I still tend toward bitterness and sarcasm. It also has a tendency to lead me toward pride. A sense of superiority over others thinking that (most probably, but definitely not always) I have suffered more than them.
However, You have begun to affect me. You've begun to change and transform me. Even those negative attributes compound the benefit by making me suffer more, and alerting me to the fact that those negative attributes are self-inflicted. You have begun to shape my suffering into compassion, and into patience. Into care for others. I'm still so far from a finished product. I still suffer with pride, which often comes from the defensiveness I learned and which became habitual. But the grip of that is loosening. Already there are times I have deep compassion and patience. They're not the norm, but they're there. One day I pray to You, Lord, that I might be supremely compassionate and loving and strong in all scenarios. Through Your grace, I hope for this, that I might be a shining beacon of Your love here on earth. That same deep, infinite and passionate love and patience You show for me, I want to reflect back into the world and be a conduit of Your converting love.