February 22, 2010

Awe-Full

There are a lot of things I would like to blog about today, but the more I think about writing them down the more I am led to just post this prayer.  I stumbled upon this prayer by way of another blogger who commented on my post Jacob Aaron.  After reading her comment, I decided to check out her blog, and this poem was her post for the day.  It is written by Frederick Ohler, and it is entitled Awe-Full.  I read this and I was speechless, but I knew I needed to share it. The first person I shared it with was Ben and he said, "That is TERRIFIC!"  He then shared it in church. I have been thinking about the words to this prayer for a few days now and I really wanted to share it with you. I think Frederick nailed it when he wrote this:
Great and holy God
awe and reverence
fear and trembling
do not come easily to us
for we are not
Old Testament Jews
or Moses
or mystics
or sensitive enough.
Forgive us
for slouching into Your presence
with little expectation
and less awe
than we would eagerly give a visiting dignitary.
We need neither Jehovah nor a buddy-
neither "the Great and Powerful Oz" nor "the man upstairs."
Help us to want what we need...
You
God
and may the altar of our hearts
tremble with delight
at Your visitation.
Amen.
-Frederick Ohler
The part that convicts me the most is: Forgive us for slouching into Your presence with little expectation and less awe than we would eagerly give a visiting dignitary.
WOW! How often do I slouch into God's presence?  Too often, I must admit. And with such little expectation.  Do I really expect God to do amazing things every day, or do I just pretend to expect it so that I won't feel "let down" if the amazing thing I was expecting Him to do doesn't happen?  All too often I just pretend to expect something and because of that I rob myself of the joy  of seeing the amazing things He does do every day.  I also give Satan more power in my life when I don't expect anything from God. Oh how this realization has made me cry out for forgiveness because I do believe that when we treat God with less respect than we would eagerly give to someone here on earth then that is a sin.  I pray that as you read this that you will let the Holy Spirit speak to you about the importance and respect you give to an Almighty, Holy, Jealous God who loves you so much that He gave His only Son for you so that you may be able to spend eternity with Him.

1 comment:

Mike said...

AWEsome! It made me re-think my attitude.