Prayers of the Ordinary ~ Wednesday

 

Wednesday arrives on your doorstep to announce a new day, what is awaiting you today?  Pause with me to ponder, “what is on your mind and in your heart right now?” 

 

The phrase, “beautiful ordinariness” is one that I am living with this summer.  So often we crave, cultivate, and want to create the “special and spectacular”.  We deeply desire the extraordinary.  We live in a world where internet influencers are famous for being famous. 

 

Where constant comparison chatters chaotically in our minds throughout the day offering unhelpful color commentary to how we live our lives in the light of what we see/read about others. 

 

Where we think our thoughts are facts rather than seeing how our brains can twist and turn things that may or may not be true; how our minds can come up with countless fictional problems to be solved.  We can hoard feelings, past hurts, words someone said to us, storing all that in boxes within our hearts.  On top of that we constantly return to rummage around those internal boxes reliving the pain. 

 

We keep striving because boredom or feeling unnecessary is too difficult.  We volunteer and go to meetings and keep our calendars fill believing that if we rest, we rust. 

 

It was once believed that because of modern inventions, the forty-hour work week would be more than cut in half and people would have abundance of leisure time.  Seriously, the economist John Maynard Keynes once said his grandkids would work just 15 hours a week!  We bought into the script that if you work hard now, one day you can enjoy your retirement.  How often do we keep on keeping on, perhaps seeing life as a struggle rather than an adventure? 

 

We need a grace of enough-ness to intercede and interrupt, O God.  We need a love that we don’t earn, but is given.  Just given.  God’s love is not deserved because of good actions, or right beliefs.  God love is…just because.  Hear God saying to you, “You are beloved so that you can be in that love.”  Please re-read that statement.  We connect to the Source of Love to be a source of love.  Love is generative and generous.  God calls us to compassion that we might offer in words and actions this day.  We receive the peace of God’s Presence that the world needs more than ever.  My prayer for you on this Wednesday is that you would know and live from a place of unconditional love and unceasing grace.  That this holy truth would be experienced and explored in your life today.  May the “beautiful ordinariness” of this day open you to the One who is co-authoring your life every day.  Amen.