Tag Archives: Prayer

909. Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty, I’m free at last. ~Adapted quoted by Martin Luther King, Jr.

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 Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Halleeelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Halleeelujah
~From Handel’s Messiah
by Georg Friedrich Händel

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To one who has long been in the throes of confining heat,
‘tis very sweet to look into the fair and open face of heaven–
to breathe a prayer full in the smile of the blue firmament.
~Adapted excerpt by John Keats

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Okay, so I realize I’m probably committing some heinous sacrilege with these revered excerpts as they relate to my topic, but there is just no better or more accurate way to describe how I feel about what was outside my door this morning. I’d long waited and waited for it, I’d long prayed and prayed for it, and I’d long shed tears over its delay. But now at long last today it has arrived. So when I opened the door and felt that first autumn chill in the air, there was simply nothing else I could do but joyfully and thankfully throw my arms up and break into a hallelujah chorus. And it didn’t matter whether it was my own “couldn’t-carry-a-tune-in-a-bucket” rendition, a squirrel’s rendition, or an opera star’s rendition! But my shamefulness didn’t just end there. It got worse! For on the heels of the hallelujah chorus I then emitted a most diabolic and wrongfully wicked laugh at the thought of the “Heat Monster’s” impending and hopefully terrible demise! Yes, folks I am apparently a complete degenerate, but I could not help myself then nor now. So praise the Lord and hallelujah that autumn is finally throwing off her meekness and moving full throttle into this wretched place. I feel like an incarcerated prisoner who has been set free and instead of having the breath sucked out of me by suffocating and prolonged mugginess, thank you, God that I can once again “breathe a prayer full in the smile of the blue” and cool “firmament!”

Relieve the troubles of my heart and free me from anguish. ~Psalm 25:17  ✝

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894. Surround yourself with people who make you hungry for life, touch your heart, and nourish your soul. ~Unknown

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Be soft.
Do not let the world make you hard.
Do not let pain make you hate.
Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness.
Take pleasure that even though the rest of the world 
may disagree,
you still believe it to be a beautiful place.
~Edited excerpt by Kurt Vonnegut

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I am human.
My feelings get hurt.
My heart aches.
I cry.
I pray.
I feel sorry for myself.
I get angry.
I make mistakes.
I love.
I admire.
I adore.
I give.
I give more.
I make mistakes.
I pray.
~Edited Unknown

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And then the day came
when the risk to remain tight
in the bud was more painful than
the risk it took to blossom.
~Edited excerpt by
Anais Nin

By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life. ~Psalm 42:8  ✝

**Images via Pinterest

http://https://youtu.be/AVgfHz_f4Os

872. The sun is new each day. ~Heraclitus

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Every day is the world made new.
I have lived all my life up to this moment,
to come to this day. I shall make of this day –
each moment of this day – a heaven on earth.
~Dan Custer

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Every morning the world is created.
Under the orange sticks of the sun
the heaped ashes of the night
turn into leaves again and
fasten themselves to the high branches —
and the ponds appear like black cloth
on which are painted islands of summer lilies.
If it is your nature to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails for hours,
your imagination alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit carries within it
the thorn that is heavier than lead —
if it’s all you can do to keep on trudging —
there is still somewhere deep within you a beast
shouting that the earth is exactly what it wanted —
each pond with its blazing lilies is a prayer
heard and answered lavishly, every morning,
whether or not you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not you have ever dared to pray.
~Mary Oliver

The whole earth is filled with awe at your wonders; where morning dawns, where evening fades, you call forth songs of joy. ~Psalm 65:8  ✝

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861. The pen is the tongue of the mind.~Miguel de Cervantes

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Keep a diary and
one day it’ll keep you.
~Mae West

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It is necessary to write, if the days are not
to slip emptily by. How else, indeed,
to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment?
For the moment passes, it is forgotten;
the mood is gone; life itself is gone.
That is where the writer scores over his fellows:
he catches the changes of his mind on the hop.
~Vita Sackville-West

However we go about the process, I believe those of us who write do find it necessary to do so. Perhaps, it’s because “clapping the net over the butterfly of the moment” helps define who we are for ourselves before “life itself is gone” and perhaps to help us know how who and what we are matters in the world. Whatever the reason, as tired as I am, I felt the need to put my fingers on the keyboard tonight. Thank you for all the prayers for my sister, Linda, and her husband, Dick. It seems that he blacked out last night because his blood pressure plummeted to critical levels. Then because the dropping of the blood pressure to such dangerously low levels causes the organs to start shutting down he went into renal failure. However, the good news tonight is that his BP is up to a normal range for him and his kidneys are functioning which means he is still on track for the transplant eligibility when a heart becomes available. Praise the Lord! The docs still have to find out what caused his blood pressure to drop so low, but I have faith that they will. Sadly he still does in fact look like he has been hit by a truck as his left eye is black, and he has a bad gash on the back of his head not to mention a whole bunch of large bruises. But they have put stitches in the cut above that eye, and as for the broken bones beneath his eye where it has turned pitch black, there is yet some question about what will need to be done, if anything, about those broken bones. They have also put staples in the cut on the back of his head, and thankfully, he apparently has no concussion. So, though very tired, we are grateful, more relieved, and praising God tonight.

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. ~Colossians 4:2  ✝

**Images via Pinterest; collage by Natalie

854. On earth there is no heaven, but there are pieces of it. ~Jules Renard

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When we recognize the virtues, the talent, the beauty of Mother Earth, something is born in us, some kind of connection, love is born. You carry Mother Earth within you. She is not outside of you. Mother Earth is not just your environment. In that insight of inter-being, it is possible to have real communication with the Earth, which is the highest form of prayer. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Sense the blessings of the earth in the perfect arc of a ripe tangerine, the taste of warm, fresh bread, the circling flight of birds, the lavender color of the sky shining in a late afternoon rain puddle, the million times we pass other beings in our cars and shops and out among the trees without crashing, conflict, or harm. ~Jack Kornfield

In the beginning God created the heavens and earth. ~Genesis 1:1 ✝
Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. ~Genesis 2:7 ✝
The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it, the world and all who live in it. ~Psalm 24:1 ✝

**Images via Pinterest, collage by Natalie

680. It is only when you start a garden – probably after age fifty – that you realize something important happens every day. ~Geoffrey B. Charlesworth

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Natural object themselves
even when they make no claim to beauty,
excite the feelings, and occupy the imagination.
Nature pleases, attracts, delights,
merely because it’s nature.
We recognize in it an Infinite Power.
~Karl Wilhelm Humboldt

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Give us hearts to understand;
never to take from creation’s beauty more than we give;
never to destroy wantonly for the furtherance of greed;
never to deny to give our hands for the building of earth’s beauty;
never to take from her what we cannot use.
Give us hearts to understand
That to destroy earth’s music is to create confusion;
that to wreck her appearance is to blind us to beauty;
That to callously pollute her fragrance
is to make a house of stench…
~Excerpted lines from a Native American Prayer

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. ~Romans 1:20   ✝

**Images via Pinterest; collage by Natalie

670. Prayer is exhaling the spirit of man and inhaling the spirit of God. ~Edwin Keith (Update on my surgery)

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When we pray,
our hearts glow
a glorious joy
that lights our souls
and all the world around us.
~Terri Guillemets

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First and foremost, I want to thank those of you who have been praying for me during this time. I so appreciate that and your prayers definitely helped me stay strong and worry very little. My knee replacement surgery was two weeks ago today, and it went very well. I returned home three days later on the following Sunday. I was walking on a walker when I left the hospital and able to get up and down steps. The two weeks of in house rehab started immediately and has also gone well. They told me when I left the hospital I was well ahead of where most folks are after three days, and the PT’s have been repeating the same kudos as they worked with me here. So I’m very pleased with how things are going. This last Sunday, the PT’s took me off the walker and put me on a cane. Then today I went back to the doctor so he could take the staples out and the incision looks good, but I gotta tell you guys that taking those staples out smarted quite a bit! There was some oozing from one of the sights where they pulled out a staple but the fluid was not yet infected. However, just to be on the safe side, they’ve started me on an antibiotic for the next ten days. So now I’m facing 4 weeks (three times a week) of out patient rehab at a local facility. And yes, there is quite a bit of pain involved in the rehab so I still need prayers please, both for the rehab and that the antibiotic stops any chance of infection. I’ve been trying my best to keep up with your blog posts, but some days it’s harder than others to do so. For example, tonight I am very tired and hurting as well so I will not be able to make it through the list this evening. Please bear with me as I do miss reading your entries. It looks as though spring is definitely getting underway here and I sure would like to be out and about, but I shall have to be patient a little longer. Unfortunately patience has never been my strong suit. Oh, well, the Lord is always the unrelenting teacher of lessons He wants us to learn. I pray all is well with all of you and thank you again for all the support. Much love and huge hugs, Natalie

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ~1 John 4:11  ✝

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622. The temple bell stops but I still hear the sound coming out of the flowers. ~Matsuo Bashō

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If a poem is thin, it is likely so not because
the poet does not know enough words,
but because he or she has not stood long enough
among the flowers-has not seen them in any
fresh, exciting, and valid way.
~Mary Oliver

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I am a kind word uttered and repeated
By the voice of Nature;
I am a star fallen from the
Blue tent upon the green carpet.
I am the daughter of the elements
With whom Winter conceived;
To whom Spring gave birth;
I was Reared in the lap of Summer and I
Slept in the bed of Autumn.

At dawn I unite with the breeze
To announce the coming of light;
At eventide I join the birds
In bidding the light farewell.

The plains are decorated with
My beautiful colors, and the air
Is scented with my fragrance.

As I embrace Slumber the eyes of
Night watch over me, and as I
Awaken I stare at the sun,
which is The only eye of the day.

I drink dew for wine, and hearken to
The voices of the birds, and dance
To the rhythmic swaying of the grass.
~Excerpted verses from Song of the Flower

~by Khalil Gibran

By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me—a prayer to the God of my life. ~Psalm 42:8  ✝

597. The new year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. ~Melody Beattie

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A fresh start.
A new chapter of life waiting to be written.
New questions to be asked, embraced, and loved.
Answers to be discovered and then lived
in a transformative year of delight and self-discovery.
~Sarah Ban Breathnach

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Recipe for a Happy New Year ~Anonymous

Take twelve fine, full-grown months; see that these are thoroughly free from old memories of bitterness, rancor and hate, cleanse them completely from every clinging spite; pick off all specks of pettiness and littleness; in short, see that these months are freed from all the past—have them fresh and clean as when they first came from the great storehouse of Time. Cut these months into thirty or thirty-one equal parts. Do not attempt to make up the whole batch at one time (so many persons spoil the entire lot this way) but prepare one day at a time.

Into each day put equal parts of faith, patience, courage, work, hope, fidelity, kindness, rest, and prayer. Put in about one teaspoonful of good spirits, a dash of fun, a pinch of folly, a sprinkling of play, and a heaping cupful of good humor.

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I Am the New Year. . .Bible Illustrator

I am the new year. I am an unspoiled page in your book of time.

I am your next chance at the art of living. I am your opportunity to practice what you have learned about life during the last twelve months.

All that you sought and didn’t find is hidden in me, waiting for you to search it but with more determination.

All the good that you tried for and didn’t achieve is mine to grant when you have fewer conflicting desires.

All that you dreamed but didn’t dare to do, all that you hoped but did not will, all the faith that you claimed but did not have—these slumber lightly, waiting to be awakened by the touch of a strong purpose.

I am your opportunity to renew your allegiance to the Lord who said, “…Behold, I make all things new.” ~Revelation 21:3   ✝

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Happy New Year everybody!  May yours be abundantly blessed!  Love, Natalie

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585. On the first day of winter, the earth awakens to the cold touch of itself. ~Laura Lush

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Alas! how changed from the fair scene,
When birds sang out their mellow lay,
And winds were soft, and woods were green,
And the song ceased not with the day!
~Excerpt from poem 
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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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Winter is Awakening
The Solstice Sun is Rising

The Heart of Nature
dreaming
Poems of Earth
now sleeping

The Seasons are
weaving
The journeys
of Creation

The Seeds
are Quickening
in Mother Nature’s
Sacred Wing

~Edited poem by Victoria Pettella

Perhaps I will stay with you for a while, or even spend the winter, so that you can help me on my journey, wherever I go. ~1 Corinthians 16:6   ✝
(Paul was speaking here to Christ followers in Corinth, but this could well be a prayer we lift up unto the Lord for safe passage through winter’s dark realm.)

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