Dear St. Lukers,
If you haven’t yet watched worship from this past Sunday, I invite you to do so. It was a beautiful service and Pastor Melissa and Ms. Lana, our Director of Children’s Ministries, pushed us to receive the Peace of Jesus and the gift of the Holy Spirit as well as to share it. They helped us understand the difference between peace keeping and peacemaking, inviting us to join daily in the Prayer of St. Francis which you can print by clicking here.
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace
Where there is hatred, let me sow love
Where there is injury, pardon
Where there is doubt, faith
Where there is despair, hope
Where there is darkness, light
And where there is sadness, joy
O Divine Master, grant that I may
Not so much seek to be consoled as to console
To be understood, as to understand
To be loved, as to love
For it is in giving that we receive
And it's in pardoning that we are pardoned
And it's in dying that we are born to Eternal Life
Amen
I have been praying this prayer daily with you and it’s pushing me in many ways. To sow seeds of peace seems like an old-fashioned discipline of a by-gone world. After all, this prayer, while attributed to St. Francis but not in his writings, was first published in 1912, but the world needs people to believe and pray this prayer today just as much as when it was first published. This prayer is the harder work of discipleship Jesus calls us to. Because he knew, he predicted, he understood how easy it would be for the disciples to find themselves divided in this world.
Which leads us to another prayer...
