Saturday, January 4, 2014

Who Controls You?

I found this particular prayer written on the back of a letterhead for Charter American Mortgage Company in Shawnee Mission, Kansas. I remember Grandpa had loads of this stationary, which he was more than happy to share with his grandchildren, who used it for myriad doodles and drawings, mostly on the back of the page.

(Update: My Dear Aunt Susan tells me: "I worked as a temporary, then a full-time employee for Charter American Mortgage Company in the late 70's. This very small company went through some ownership changes and then moved in with a large property management company in Kansas City. We had to have all new stationery printed with the new address, thus the 'perfect artistic sketching' paper that your Grandfather acquired. I noticed that he used some of this for his prayers, which made me smile, as your Grandfather practiced, 'Waste not, want not.'")

On the back of this one, he writes:

O LORD, renew our spirits and draw our hearts to THYSELF, that our work may not be in us a burden but a delight, and give us such a mighty love for THEE as may sweeten our obedience. Oh, let us not serve THEE with the spirit of bondage, as slaves, but with the cheerfulness and gladness of children, delighting ourselves in THEE, and rejoicing in THY work.

Psalm 37:4: "Take delight in the LORD, and HE will give you the desires of your heart."

Let's not kid ourselves. Work is work. That's why it's called work. But doing GOD'S work is a different job, that calls for different frames of mind. A relationship with GOD is not meant to hold us down; it was never meant to. GOD gives us a great deal of liberty, but as Bishop Fulton Sheen once said, true freedom is freedom to do what we ought. We're not controlled by either our own selfish desires or some totalitarian state, but only by what GOD wants from us.

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