Three days until the presidential elections…. It is noisy, it is windy, it is cold and brash out there. Let me ask: Where are you? Do you feel buried deep inside, hiding beneath layers of noise and cold, blowing winds?
Where are you in there? Can you find yourself amongst the noise? Can you hear yourself? Can you hear from the Lord? If not, what is clouding you? What intruder does not belong?
This is a great time for self-examination, to go from a global, national and digital view to a personal, introspective, heart view. Don’t wait. Today is a wonderful time to check in on ourselves, to check in with the Lord, to take inventory and to purge that which is sick and toxic, and to receive cleansing.
What weight or burden are you carrying that is not yours to carry? Are you carrying the anger you’ve picked up by others or by the news? Are you carrying the anxiety that the world, politicians and speakers have inflicted upon you? Are you carrying offense for someone else or shouldering their burden?
I am noticing a lot of layers clouding our hearts, cluttering our Godly desires and our usual outlooks. How have you changed? What have you picked up that is not yours to bare? Where are you inside of there? Are you ready to put the burden down, to relinquish it?
I am asking the Lord to help me, to search me… “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139:23-24). Our purity and our peace are worth the search. It is for us and for those whose lives we touch. If you too feel hidden, even trapped, beneath the chaos, join me in this prayer.
Prayer Lord, the world feels like a mess. I feel anxious. I feel irritated. My love, trust and patience for others feels small. It feels threatened. I ask you to remove the sickness, the toxins that have seeped in during the chaos. Remove it. Remove anything in me that is sick, anything that is bad, anything dark or bothersome, in Jesus name. Create in me a clean, pure heart, oh God. Replace darkness with light. Replace doubt and fear with hope and trust in you. Cause your love for others to swell within me, and give me grace for myself during these trying times. May your good and your peace govern me, govern my family, and guard us. I ask you to hem me in before and behind. Hem in my family. You are our protector, our provider, our Lord and friend. I love you, Lord. Make me more like you and less like me, less like this world, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Sarah Guldalian 