To be that self which one truly is, is indeed the opposite of despair.
- Soren Kierkegaard

I read Kierkegaard’s [pronounced keer-ker-guard] words yesterday, and they were water to my soul.  Not sure why I was so impacted, but it served as a great reminder that the person I see in the mirror, somehow, is “God’s enough”…Flaws and all.

It’s almost as if Kierkegaard were saying, we’re healthiest when we show up to life’s party dressed as ourselves.  If not, we’ll eventually be disappointed from the ill-fitting costumes and false selves we tend to wear.

One question I’ve been wrestling with is, “Why is it so difficult to be our God-given selves?” In a world of “total makeovers” and continual reinvention, it takes a lot of courage to come to the party dressed as ourselves.

Perhaps a first step is to trust God’s love for us as it’s expressed through others. In other words surrounding ourselves with people who accept, love, and affirm who we really are – as a gift from heaven.

So this is my prayer for us today:

Christ of our bodies and souls,
Send us friends,
Who would help us to see ourselves through You.

Amen.

The Lord’s Prayer
Eternal Spirit,
Earth-maker, Pain bearer, Life-giver,
Source of all that is and that shall be,
Father and Mother of us all,
Loving God, in whom is heaven:

The hallowing of your name echo through the universe!
The way of your justice be followed by the peoples of the world!
Your heavenly will be done by all created beings!

Your commonwealth of peace and freedom
Sustain our hope and come on earth!
With the bread we need for today, feed us.
In the hurts we absorb from one another,forgive us.

In times of temptation and test, strengthen us.
From trial too great to endure,spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil,free us.
For you reign in the glory of the power that is love,now and forever.

Amen.

From A New Zealand Prayer Book (Harper Collins, 1997), 181.

By: José Humphreys

May your doors create safety for patronage,
A hospitality providing confidence to the guarded shopper,
While you seek the shalom and prosperity of the city,
Whether transacting face-to-face, or in virtual reality.

May each customer intimately know the exquisite labor of your craft
May you remember each person by name,
Children created in the image of God, with both needs and wants
Treating them as if they alone existed in this big world,
Seeing all, with the eyes of God’s heart within you.

I pray you would discern each story of economic uncertainty,
And let the storehouses of your generosity nourish many,
For with each dollar sown – you feed the eternal enterprise.

May God continue to establish the works of your hand,
May the vision your soul mediates animate the spaces you create,
A culture that communicates without words, your manner of careful consideration.

May you cultivate a diligence that produces excellence in your field,
May you embrace a Sabbath rest with a robust faith – the strength to let go
As you hand-off your labor to the Eternal Shop Keeper,
Who never sleeps, nor slumbers.

I pray that at the end of your day – as you wipe your brow,
You might release your earthly preoccupations,
Realizing full well that you serve the Inexhaustible Artisan who once said,
“It was good!”

May God’s perfect shalom give you strength to return tomorrow,
Providing you with sufficient capital to continue
As you live dreams that will outgrow you in the now,
And will echo nearby in the eternal.

Amen.