From the Rector

Dear friends,

The first thing we learn when we pray is to let go of anxiety and cast all our cares in the hands of God. We learn stillness, and that involves letting pain and joy and all of life, everything within us, be prayer. 

We have to love God with all that comes to us and try as we might to rest under it and love God with it. Christ resides in the deep end of our hearts, and he asks that we give ourselves to the work of his lovingkindness.

We sleep, and in the morning rise the heart of God deeply stirs our own, fills us with the breath of new day, and speaks in us his words holding us fast.

We learn peacefully to lift our souls to God, by God’s strength, who wills and works in us for his own good pleasure and for our healing. God fills us with faith, imparts prayer to the seeker, fills the despairing with hope and, if we desire, we have already found God. When we cry out to God and lift up our hearts, God has already heard the voice of our prayers, for the desire to pray is prayer, with and without many words.

Each day we turn our eyes to the evening sun as it goes down, and we praise God for the day that is past. We close our eyes in sleep, with the vow of God to keep watch over us through the night hours.

We give thanks for strength when we feel strong. We hold aloft our needs, knowing Christ’s strength is made perfect in our needs. When we are weak, he is strong. We give thanks for everything that is true and good in others.

O Lord, open our minds and hearts to receive what you desire to say and give us. Open our hands to give to your service and for the world’s need what is ours to give. Open our hearts to love you, to pray for those dear to us, to forgive any who have wronged us, and to ask forgiveness of those we have wronged. In your Name we pray. Amen.

Bless you, friends, in the weeks of Lent ahead. 

Yours in Christ~

Fr. Peter Helman