Success take Three

As we have been prayerfully pondering our own understandings of success...what is roaming and rummaging around my mind is a wonderful prayer by Thomas Merton.

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

I, especially, love that second line... "I have no idea where I am going"...

Yup.  That seems like a daily truth for me.

I don't always see clearly...I stumble and bumble...fall flat on my face.  I get turned around and confused.

Then, I love that line that in the midst of the confounding and confusing...that the desire to please God DOES please God.

Imagine God delighting in the orientation of our hearts toward God and the good of others/world.  Not because we arrived at some predetermined destination of success.
Not because we have proven ourselves and God awards us with a certificate.
Not because we deserve or earn God's graceful/loving presence.

But because that is who God is.
And who we are in our deepest sense.  That is the desire, to connect with the part of ourselves that is kept hidden because the world is too wild, harsh, and hard to let that vulnerability be exposed to the raw elements.

I invite you to hold this prayer this weekend.

Pray it.

Let it simmer in your soul.

Let the words sit on your tongue ~ to determine/distinguish the taste of each.

Let the truths sink down and see how they sit within you...do they awaken joy or confusion or indifference?

How might this prayer speak to and sing out about the question, what is success, that has been guiding us all week long?

I pray that as we dive together into these waters...there will be more than a trace of grace that buoys us and helps us float in God's presence.

Amen.