Chrysostom
Beloved of All
Your longing to return to your first love is pleasing to God and we join with you in this prayer. For we love because He first loved us, and when that love grows cold we are called to remember, to repent and to do the things we did at first.
The first and great commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength, and the second is like it, to love your neighbor as yourself. From this love all else flows. When love for God is whole, love for one another is increased, and the things of God follow.
We pray with you for extra grace to choose the better part as Mary did, who sat in humility and listened to the teaching of Jesus, which will not be taken away from her. In a world full of distractions, this choice requires discipline. We ask the Father to give you that discipline and grace, not only for this summer but for all your life, to put away what distracts and to give yourself to prayer, to study of the Word, and to worship.
Prayer is a great weapon. Each day is like a battle and a storm with many rocks, and we need arms to go through it without shipwreck. We need to make God favorable to us by prayer early in the morning and by night, so that we go forth to our daily work with security and with no enemy able to overcome us. We ask for grace to pray in the Holy Spirit and to study the Scriptures diligently, that you may learn His Word and share the truth with power from on high, bearing the fruit of the Spirit and walking in holiness and in the gifts He gives for the building up of the Church, as you earnestly desire love and the things that edify.
We also pray that you will not forsake assembling together, for much strength arises from being together. Where two or three are gathered in His name, He is in the midst of them, and love is increased by gathering together, and when love is increased the earnest prayer of the people has great power. As the apostles went through confirming the churches and teaching first what was first, so we pray you will be established and will help make disciples, baptizing and teaching obedience to all that Christ commanded.
May the Lord protect you from sin and from the evil one and keep you from being drawn away. May He restore the fire that once burned bright and clear, and set your lamp again to burn with holy love and reverence. We thank Him for His great love and ask all this in the name of Jesus, whose name is holy. Amen.
The first and great commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength, and the second is like it, to love your neighbor as yourself. From this love all else flows. When love for God is whole, love for one another is increased, and the things of God follow.
We pray with you for extra grace to choose the better part as Mary did, who sat in humility and listened to the teaching of Jesus, which will not be taken away from her. In a world full of distractions, this choice requires discipline. We ask the Father to give you that discipline and grace, not only for this summer but for all your life, to put away what distracts and to give yourself to prayer, to study of the Word, and to worship.
Prayer is a great weapon. Each day is like a battle and a storm with many rocks, and we need arms to go through it without shipwreck. We need to make God favorable to us by prayer early in the morning and by night, so that we go forth to our daily work with security and with no enemy able to overcome us. We ask for grace to pray in the Holy Spirit and to study the Scriptures diligently, that you may learn His Word and share the truth with power from on high, bearing the fruit of the Spirit and walking in holiness and in the gifts He gives for the building up of the Church, as you earnestly desire love and the things that edify.
We also pray that you will not forsake assembling together, for much strength arises from being together. Where two or three are gathered in His name, He is in the midst of them, and love is increased by gathering together, and when love is increased the earnest prayer of the people has great power. As the apostles went through confirming the churches and teaching first what was first, so we pray you will be established and will help make disciples, baptizing and teaching obedience to all that Christ commanded.
May the Lord protect you from sin and from the evil one and keep you from being drawn away. May He restore the fire that once burned bright and clear, and set your lamp again to burn with holy love and reverence. We thank Him for His great love and ask all this in the name of Jesus, whose name is holy. Amen.
