For Today: A Prayer When Life Gets Messy

For Today

A Prayer When Life Gets Messy

Patrick Allen

for today

A Prayer When Life Gets Messy

Copyright © 2018 Patrick Allen. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

Cascade Books

An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

Eugene, OR 97401

www.wipfandstock.com

paperback isbn: 978-1-5326-3197-9

hardcover isbn: 978-1-5326-3199-3

ebook isbn: 978-1-5326-3198-6

Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

Names: Allen, Patrick, author.

Title: For today : a prayer when life gets messy / Patrick Allen.

Description: Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2018 | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: isbn 978-1-5326-3197-9 (paperback) | isbn 978-1-5326-3199-3 (hardcover) | isbn 978-1-5326-3198-6 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Prayer—Christianity.

Classification: BV210.2 .A45 2018 (print) | BV210.2 (ebook)

Manufactured in the U.S.A. August 13, 2018

Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version NIV Copyright 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by Permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

For Today, a prayer found in Forward Day by Day, used by permission. Forward Movement, 412 Sycamore Street, Cincinnati, OH, 45202.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Introduction: O God!

Part I: In the Ditch

Chapter 1: Finding Strength for Today

Chapter 2: Losing Courage before Difficulties

Chapter 3: Proving Recreant to Duties

Chapter 4: Losing Faith in Other People

Chapter 5: Enduring Ingratitude, Treachery, and Meanness

Chapter 6: Minding and Giving Little Stings

Part II: On Down the Road

Chapter 7: Keeping a Clean Heart

Chapter 8: Facing Failure with Honesty and Courage

Chapter 9: Seeing Good in All Things

Chapter 10: Receiving a New Vision

Chapter 11: Regaining the Spirit of Joy and Gladness

Chapter 12: Being the Cup of Strength to Suffering Souls

Closing Comments

Dedication

When you find yourself in the ditch, asking God for enough strength to make it through another day and get back home by dark, it is comforting to have some dear friends who journey with you. I will always be mindful of the way David, Dirk, and Ken stuck with me through thick and thin, and thankful for their listening ear, encouragement, and friendship, literally being the cup of strength to this suffering soul. This book is dedicated to them.

And I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the constant love, support, and encouragement I received from my wife, Lori, during the difficulties I experienced that preceded this writing project, and during the actual writing of the book. She read every word of the manuscript and patiently listened to numerous versions of the stories contained herein. She is my partner and my rock. Simply put, this book would not have been written without her.

For me, it all comes down to this:

Life is messy, but God is faithful.

Preface

This book is based on a prayer written by Phillips Brooks, perhaps best known today for writing O Little Town of Bethlehem, one of the most beloved of our Christmas carols. However, in his day, he was regarded as one of the best preachers of his generation, and his sermons are still read today. And so is his prayer, "For Today."

My wife and I first discovered this prayer while on a trip to South Carolina, tracing the ministry of John Wesley. We stopped by a beautiful little Episcopal church, and while inside we saw a small daily devotional booklet, Forward Day by Day, published by Forward Movement, the publishing arm of the Episcopal Church. For Today was printed on the back of the booklet. I was struck by the urgency and honesty of the prayer, so I left some money in the collection basket and took a booklet with me. We are now regular subscribers to Forward Day by Day, and have been so for more than fifteen years. We read or recite this prayer every morning as part of our devotions together. Even though I have prayed this prayer thousands of times, it remains fresh and vital each morning.

And I carry a copy of For Today in my meeting calendar and notebook. During especially tough times at work (and there have been more than a few), I opened my notebook and silently prayed this prayer. Sometimes during very tough meetings, more than once. It was a comfort and a challenge to not mind little stings or give them, to see good in all things, and to be a cup of strength to suffering souls—even at times when I was the one who was suffering. This prayer has helped me through many a difficult day.

I asked Forward Movement for permission to use this prayer as the foundation for this book, and I am grateful to them for their permission and indebted to Scott Gunn for his encouragement to do so. I have attempted to take each element from the prayer and fashion it into a chapter, first discussing the idea (for example, seeing good in all things), relating it to Scripture, and offering some practical suggestions for making it a reality in your life. There are also some questions for reflection at the end of each chapter that you can use in your private devotions or as part of a small group. It is my hope that the twelve chapters of this book will be helpful to those of us who are crying out, Oh, God. Give me strength to live another day! I’m just trying to get through the day and back home by dark. As you will see, even in the toughest of times, we are not alone. When life gets messy, God is right there in the mess with us, working to bring hope and healing and grace for the journey.

At the end of the day, this prayer, For Today, challenges all of us to work through our own difficulties with God’s help, and ultimately become a cup of strength to other suffering souls. If this book, For Today: A Prayer When Life Gets Messy, can help us do so, then my labors will not have been in vain.

* * *

One final note—each chapter starts with a story. I do have a reputation for being a storyteller, so you might wonder at some point if the stories you are reading are actually true. I can tell you that many of the stories happened just the way I describe them. A few have been purposely modified or merged together with another story or two to shield someone’s identity or to make a certain point without sharing too much personal detail. And in a case or two, I tell the story just the way I remember it, but I must confess that my family, friends, colleagues, even a boss or two, may remember it differently. I have been prone to exaggeration on a time or two. This is no attempt at fraud; rather, it is simply the result of the passing of time, an active imagination, numerous retelling of the stories, and perhaps a faulty memory. In any case, the stories are true (that is, there is much truth for the taking) whether they happened just the way I describe them or not.

Patrick Allen

Newberg, Oregon

June 8, 2017

Introduction: O God!

For Today

O God:

Give me strength to live another day;

Let me not turn coward before its difficulties or prove recreant to its duties;

Let me not lose faith in other people;

Keep me sweet and sound of heart, in spite of ingratitude, treachery, or meanness;

Preserve me from minding little stings or giving them;

Help me to keep my heart clean, and to live so honestly and fearlessly that no outward failure can dishearten me or take away the joy of conscious integrity;

Open wide the eyes of my soul that I may see good in all things;

Grant me this day some new vision of thy truth;

Inspire me with the spirit of joy and gladness;

And make me the cup of strength to suffering souls;

In the name of the strong Deliverer, our only Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

—Phillips Brooks

Life is messy. It either has been, is, or will be. We can count on it. It is a part of life, and becoming a Christian is not an insurance policy against tough or terrible times. I wish it was, but it is clearly not. We are not immune from pain, rejection, disappointment, failure, and loss. Yes, life is messy, and sooner or later we will find ourselves in a mess—or a mess will find us. Count on it.

But we can count on another thing, too—God is faithful. Where is God when we are in a mess? Right there in the mess with us, bringing grace and comfort and healing to our situation, even when it is of our own doing, perhaps even more so when this is true. Yes, life is messy, but God is faithful. We can take that to the bank.

Please understand—I am not saying that our messes are necessarily good, or that we should intentionally go around looking for a mess to wallow in just to see God at work. Surely, God is at work all the time, and I suspect that there is a healthy disdain in the heavenly realm for the messes we find ourselves in or make for ourselves. But I am saying that even in the messes we make, God is there and at work. When there is nothing else to hold on to, we can hold on to that. God is present, and faithful, too.

In this book, I want to share a daily prayer that can be truly life giving when we are in the mess of life. It offers words to consistently pray, and wisdom, hope, and resources for our spiritual journey. Several years ago, I found myself praying this prayer almost every day in earnest. You see, my professional work turned into a painful struggle. After a successful thirty-year career, I found myself in a deep mess. I couldn’t please my boss, I couldn’t garner the support of my colleagues, and I couldn’t build a cohesive team or effectively lead those who reported to me. I had succeeded before in other settings, but no matter how hard I tired, all my efforts seemed to end up in criticism, frustration, and, at times, outright failure. I began to lose confidence in my own abilities, and my sense of calling, too.

For the first time in my career, it was obvious to me that some of my colleagues would be happy to see me hit the highway, and they were not shy about sharing their feelings—even in staff meetings with my boss. In spite of my best efforts, they simply didn’t want me on the team. I was constantly under attack, and the endless litany of long and empty meetings was mind numbing. I resented the way I was being treated, and I came to fear that I would be dismissed, something that I had never dreamed could happen to me. Honestly, I didn’t want to go to work, so I started out each day by praying, Oh God, give me strength! Thankfully, strength did come, in many ways, in unexpected ways.

This morning prayer will help you, too, but I must warn you, this may not be a helpful exercise for the spiritually complacent, for those on spiritual autopilot. If life is all good and you have no struggles or concerns, you might consider finding another book. This is not a vacation feel-good read. No, this is for those of us who are praying prayers in earnest, in desperation. It is for folk who are in trouble, in pain, in isolation, in despair, in the ditch—and at one time or another, that’s most of us. It is not a prayer for those who feel that they have arrived, but for those of us who are still on the journey, walking wearily on a lonely road with no particular destination in sight. This prayer is for those of us who begin the day by crying out, O God, give me strength!

I want you to start the practice of praying this prayer, "For Today," each morning. You will find that it is a centering prayer, one that speaks to the core of your spirit and to your particular situation. And together, we will reflect carefully on each phrase, because it is a teaching prayer, too. My earnest desire is that it will carry you as it has carried me. To begin our journey together, I want to tell a story about Reuben Roberts. We can all identify with some of the challenges and opportunities he faced.

Reuben Roberts

Reuben Roberts lived in the hill country of Tennessee on a small farm about eight miles outside of Erin, the county seat of Houston County, just a mile or so down Tennessee Ridge and a short distance from the Tennessee River. The farm consisted of five eight-acre fields used mostly for growing soy beans and hay, a small creek, a springhouse, two old weather-worn storage buildings, an outhouse, and one hundred sixty acres of old-growth hardwoods up on the hill, mostly walnut, oak, hickory, and ash. He and his large family lived in an old walnut log house built sometime just before the Civil War. They tell about the time that some of Grant’s troops occupied the house for a time after the Battle of Fort Donelson over in Dover in 1862. They sat around the fireplace chewing and spitting tobacco, and the juice dripped through the floorboards, landing on Confederate soldiers hiding below. I don’t know if that really happened, but it is certainly a good story nonetheless. I bought that old farmhouse in the 1980s from one of Reuben’s sons. On quiet winter evenings, I would sit by that same fireplace and imagine the conversations that went on so many years before. If only those old walls could talk . . .

In the Tennessee hills, funerals are something special to behold, and they are a celebration of community when an elder is laid to rest. There isn’t much liturgy or pomp and circumstance, mostly stories, a few hymns, and shared remembrances—some good, some funny, mostly true. This was true of Reuben’s funeral, too. During the service, a middle-aged man rose to speak. Reuben Roberts was a good man, he began. He was not only a good farmer, but a good preacher, too. As a young man, he was a circuit rider, a preacher with a horse and a Bible, filling the pulpit on alternate Sundays in Erin and Dixon. Once while returning from Dixon, he was stopped by an angry posse. It seems that someone had robbed, beaten, and otherwise mistreated a young woman in Dixon, and Reuben fit the general description of the perpetrator. The foreman of the posse led Reuben over to a nearby tree and put a rope around his neck. ‘Before we hang you, do you have anything to say?’ he asked. ‘If so, now is the time to utter your last words.’ So, Reuben did. He bowed his head and prayed. He prayed for his family, he prayed for his churches, he prayed for his neighbors, he prayed for himself, and then he prayed for his accusers. When he was through, he raised his head, looked the foreman in the eyes, and told him that he was as ready as he ever would be. The foreman cleared his throat, then turned to the posse and said, ‘You’d better cut him down, boys, we’ve got the wrong man.’ So, they did.

The storyteller continued, I’ve heard that old story about a hundred times now, and told it more than a few times myself. You see, that foreman was my grandfather, and he never forgot the day he almost hung an innocent man. He always cautioned me to avoid judging a book by its cover. There is no doubt, Reuben Roberts was a good man.

As the middle-aged man sat down, a woman just a bit older stood to her feet. Yes, she began in a matter-of-fact way, Reuben Roberts was a good man. And not only was he a good preacher, he was a good neighbor, too. You see, late one bitterly cold winter’s night, Reuben could not sleep. He woke up worried about his neighbors down the valley—about three miles away. As much as he tried, he couldn’t rest, so he got up, dressed, saddled the horse, and headed off down the dirt road toward the river. Like Abraham, he obeyed and went, although he didn’t know exactly where he was going or why. As he approached his neighbor’s cabin, he saw a dim, flickering light in the window. When he knocked on the door, a small girl appeared and simply began to cry. You see, her daddy was gone and her mother was desperately ill with the flu, near death. There was no food in the house, and the firewood was almost gone. Reuben brought in some wood and stoked the fire. He told the girl that he would return shortly. He rode back to his farm, got his wife out of bed, and sent her back to the neighbor’s cabin with some hot food and comfort. He then set off for the town eight miles in the other direction to fetch the doctor. Of course, the doctor was not excited about heading out into the hills on such a terribly cold night, but Reuben persisted. He mentioned later that he had to part with a butchered hog to get the neighbor some help, but he was glad to do so.

The women looked around at those sitting in the church and said in earnest, I know this happened because I was the little girl in the cabin that night. Truly, Reuben Roberts was a good man.

Slowly, an even older man stood to speak. Stabilizing himself by leaning on his cane and the back of the pew in front of him, he started in a slow but steady voice, Reuben Roberts was not only a good man and a good neighbor, which he surely was, he was a generous one, too. You see, Reuben also worked for the county as the Road Commissioner during the depression. In those days that mostly meant supervising the road crew as they graded the roads with a blade pulled by a team of mules. One day as they were grading a back road, Reuben saw a young farmer plowing an adjacent field with a two-horse team. Reuben told the road crew to stop and rest as he climbed over the fence to talk to the farmer. ‘I don’t know exactly why I am doing this,’ he told the young farmer, ‘but I feel like I should give you this.’ He pulled out a five-dollar bill from his pocket and handed it to the farmer. In those days, that was a lot of money. Tears streamed down the farmer’s face as he stared at the money in his hand. ‘Thank you so much, sir. I don’t know how you knew, but last winter was such a terrible one for us. It was so bad, in fact, that we had to eat our seed corn to survive, and this is enough money to buy the seed we need for planting season. I don’t know how I can ever repay you.’ The old man finished by saying, Yes, I know it sounds beyond belief, but I know it happened because I was the young farmer who received that remarkable gift. Reuben Roberts was a good man, indeed. May he rest in peace.

It was as if the benediction had been pronounced. The locals began to disperse from the church, and I quickly made my way across the parking lot and over to the old farmer who told the story about having no seed corn before he could climb into his pickup and drive off. That was a miracle! I blurted out. Yes, he agreed, how he knew I was in need of seed for planting and generous enough to part with his money during that terrible depression is a true miracle.

Oh, I said, the fact that Reuben was sensitive to God’s prompting and generous enough to follow through is certainly a wonderful story, but that’s not the miracle that I am talking about. No, the miracle for me is that you were out there plowing your fields when you didn’t have any seed to plant, plowing without any guarantee of a crop to harvest in the fall. Now, that’s a miracle!

The old farmer just looked up at me with misty eyes, nodded, and smiled at me as I asked, What made you go out to the barn and hitch up a team in such circumstances? Why would anyone do that without having any seeds to plant?

Well, the old farmer said as he gazed off into the distance, there are times in life when all you can do is get out of bed and step into the work that calls you—and not think about much else. You go to work where you are with what you’ve got, and you do what you can. If nothing else, hard work has its own reward.

Yes, indeed.

* * *

I think there is something in this story for each of us. For one thing, sometimes you are falsely accused or people see things in you or say things about you that are simply not true. They don’t seem to see the good in anything you do. This can be so very hurtful, and many times it comes down to one word against another. You can’t prove anything. So, what to do? You pray, O God, help! You pray, O God, please let the truth prevail, but above all else, let my character be clearly evident regardless of the outcome—let my life speak. You try to live in such a way that the foreman will say, Cut the rope, boys. We’ve got the wrong person. You pray that your life will speak the truth. Of course, there is no guarantee of success, but it is a prayer that leads to conscience integrity. For Today speaks to those of us who walk this road.

Sometimes you are on the other end of the rope. You’re the one who has misjudged, misunderstood, misconstrued, misapprehended—or even worse. What then? You pray, O God, I’m sorry. Give me the strength to step forward and admit my mistakes. Let me not wait, make excuses, or rationalize. You owe it to those you have hurt, and to yourself, to make the matter right as quickly and carefully as possible. To be forthright and honest in situations where you have been wrong takes a rare kind of courage, and a good deal of humility, too. You start by praying daily that you will not lose faith in other people—or in yourself.

Sometimes you feel a nudging or hear a still small voice saying—go check on your neighbor. May you be sensitive to the voice of the Holy Spirit and obedient to God’s direction in your life at such times. When you sense God at work, lean in. But sometimes you are the one in desperate need, often because of your own poor choices. What then? You pray, O God, help me to be perceptive enough to recognize and humble enough to accept help and assistance when offered. And help me to deal with my own pride and have the courage to ask for help when I am in need. That takes a rare form of courage, too. In the end, you pray that you will be the cup of strength to suffering souls, and trust that others will bear the cup for you in your own time of need.

Sometimes helping a neighbor in need or a