We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts.
Sir, don’t make a bigger fool out of yourself because I promise you, if my car is not here when I leave service today . . . just pray for rapture.
I sometimes pray not for self-knowledge in general but for just so much self knowledge at the moment as I can bear and use at the moment; the little daily dose.
If you are not in good terms with the one who sent you, you can’t have the right direction to the errands he wants to send you for. Be in good talking terms with God; pray without ceasing!
Had his own way of praying, he had said; that old excuse. As if we were meant to be solitary. As if the church were not about holding the community together, as this sinful one needed.
His memory is perfectly clear and serves no good, no purpose at all. He has seen things before (the fly in the bottle, the indeterminate will). Santa Muerte, Saint Death, we pray to you to swallow our breath.
His memory is perfectly clear and serves not good, no purpose at all. He has seen things before (the fly in the bottle, the indeterminate will). Santa Muerte, Saint Death, we pray to you to swallow our breath.
I guarantee you that after you die you will not say 'I spent too much time praying; I wish I had watched more TV instead.
The more you pray, the less you'll panic. The more you worship, the less you worry. You'll feel more patient and less pressured.
But we need to pray daily for humility and honesty to see these sinful attitudes for that they really are, and then for grace and discipline to root them out of our minds and replace them with thoughts pleasing to God.
It was as if God had become not only the object of my praise and thanksgiving but my creative partner as well.
I found myself praying: "May I love and accept myself just as I am.
He doesn’t let me argue further as he returns to his room. I pray for my sanity that he clothes himself, because the last thing I need is the image of Blake’s naked torso dripping in sweat.
You can speak with spiritual eloquence, pray in public, and maintain a holy appearance... but it is your behavior that will reveal your true character.
There will be grace and forgiveness enough, old dog, even for you. I pray you will spare me a drink from that cup, when it overflows for you. - Miles Vorkosigan
the moment you don't feel like praying, get on your knees. And the moment you don't feel like reading your bible, you'd better get that Book open.
And so I pray I am today as honest with myself, with life all around me and below and above me, with all who I encounter.
Not many people bothered to look for beauty beyond the greenhouses. They went about life with their heads down, just praying to get through the day, to feed themselves and their family. No one ever did anything to make it better.
But now, here she was, very wishful to pray, while not knowing how to explain her dilemma: ‘I’m terribly unhappy, dear, unprobable God—’ would not be a very propitious beginning.
Ask God to make you like David: an intercessor, even in the midst of your own great sins and great needs.
The trigger has been squeezed, the deathly mechanism has been enabled, the fatal course of a bullet has been set. No amount of bleating or praying or wailing of cajoling can halt it or stall it or call it back.
