Tag Archives: God

In Praise

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Praise like cascading waters, like rushing rivers,

Praise like flying birds, and flight of eagles.

Praise like thundering herds cross vast expanse.

Praise written cross skies in clouds and drifting mists.

Praise with the quaking aspen. Praise golden and blissful.

Praise to the heavens, to the highest heavens.

Heartfelt and hallowed, on angels’ wings and from the mouths of babes.

Hush; listen in silence.
Creation, on tip toe, peering beyond Time to Eternity.

Time poised on the brink of the Eternal, awaiting Your Word.

Praise from the heart, one poor and yearning heart.

Come, O Immortal. Come!
 

By Joann Nelander



Cry of the Heart

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My Prayer

Lord, do others speak to you in whole sentences.

My prayer is like me in my raw and bewildered state,

mind and feelings at war within me,

straining to understand, to comprehend myself,

and wondering what You desire,

still in a quandary to know what to pray;

indeed, how to prayer.

All I know is that You, O Lord, are.

Though I seem alone, You are with me,

Your Holy Name, my byword.

My prayer is Your Name,

Now echoing in the Father’s ear.

I do not call it back.

It shall resound through eternity,

and on its strains I hold fast.

I wait and I adore.

Let me rest here,

safe in Your embrace.

By Joann Nelander

Expanding Our Desire In Prayer

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Stained glass at St John the Baptist's Anglica...

Image via Wikipedia

St. Augustine’s Instruction:

Let us exercise our desire in prayer

Why in our fear of not praying as we should, do we turn to so many things, to find what we should pray for? Why do we not say instead, in the words of the psalm: I have asked one thing from the Lord, this is what I will seek: to dwell in the Lord’s house all the days of my life, to see the graciousness of the Lord, and to visit his temple? There, the days do not come and go in succession, and the beginning of one day does not mean the end of another; all days are one, simultaneously and without end, and the life lived out in these days has itself no end.
So that we might obtain this life of happiness, he who is true life itself taught us to pray, not in many words as though speaking longer could gain us a hearing. After all, we pray to one who, as the Lord himself tells us, knows what we need before we ask for it. Continue reading →

For Fear Apart

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Why apart? From the in-gathering, all embracing Mother Church you flee, to remain apart all the while, calling and yearning for your God.  You flee and I run after you, pursuing you at every turn, and twist and fall. I reach and you pull your hand away.  Why not stay?  My Body yearns for you. My members long to know you.

I wait upon your prayers with angels ready to dispatch.
O, Pardoned Soul, you seek your God in myriad ways, I am here, wedded to My Bride, always at her side. promised never to depart. You hold yourself apart.

You’ve built a chapel in your heart for others that play God,
I call and draw you by Love within the chapel of your heart.
You sigh as I tug at heart strings tight and taunt.  You resist Me for fear they’ll break. I woo, I’m told to wait.  You say you are not ready for Love’s music.

“Measure me Your Love,” you say.  “Give comfort, strength and sure supply, but do not on my ‘Yes’ rely.”

Perhaps the Bride, the Church, who bears My Word forth unto all centuries, has words you n’er obey, in dread fear of the “ought” you can not bear. You will your will be done on earth and choose to judge all heaven.   You want only love’s first glance, the sweet embrace and kiss upon the cheek, nothing too dear, nothing too deep.  It seems a bitter end, to lose yourself in giving all, O Measured One.

You know Love comes with a Cross, a Cross you fear to carry. You choose to stay apart and skirt the Cross. Alas, the world without has crosses, too.  They may come disguised in promised delight, but soon you’ll drag that empty dream uphill.  How long one longs and labors longingly and all alone beneath the weight of vanities profane,  I do not say. I only await a cry, a plea, glance of recognition.  When our eyes meet, then our hearts meet;  at long last your leap into the arms of One Who grasps you in your fall.

Be mine as Church joined to Husband.  At last the Lord of All can leap the walls you’ve built about yourself to know you now within His Sacred Heart, bearing your cross in His,making all things new and all your burdens light. Count now as joy life without measure.

Fear not my Church.   She is My Spouse, My very Body; I ,the Head.
I woo and wait,  now, as Groom upon the altar.  You must give yourself away.

 

by Joann Nelander

My All in All

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Lord,  be the Alpha and Omega of my moments this day.

Be the beginning and end of my every thought, inclination and desire,

the motus primo primi of my every action.

I offer you each breath I draw,

every heart beat.

I expose to Your Merciful Heart my every sin,

failure  and fault.

I lay my complaints at your feet and nail my concupiscence to Your Cross.

You, Lord, are my Heart, and my Healing,

You are purest Mercy.

Be my All in All.

by Joann Nelander