Tuesday, May 14, 2024  

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Today's Hymn
“Take My Life”

Take my voice and let me sing
always, only, for my king,
take my lips and let them be
filled with messages from thee,
filled with messages from thee.

Take my silver and my gold;
not a mite would I withhold;
take my intellect and use
every power as thou shalt choose,
every power as thou shalt choose.

by Frances Ridley Havergal
Hymn 697, Glory to God
verse 3–4

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Reflection

Teresa of Avila is known for saying that “Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body.”

This is such a powerful image to contemplate — the idea that Christ dwells in us and moves through us in the world. The Apostle Paul wrote to the Ephesians that “there is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all” (Ephesians 4:4–6).

God is in us, but to find messages from God on our lips for others to hear, we first have to open our hearts and ears to hear what God is saying to us. Since God is love, as it says in 1 John 4:16, can you trust that God loves you? Can you believe that you are a beloved child of God? Sometimes when we cannot believe, it is a good time to fake it till we make it, repeating, “I want to believe that you love me God. I love you.” Again and again repeat this like a prayer.

When we know that God loves us, then God’s message to others may rest on our lips, and we might say, “Hello, beloved child of God. You belong to God and God belongs to you.”

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Prayer
God of compassion, fill my heart with trust in your love. Comfort and strengthen me so that I may speak your love with warmth and grace to all I meet. Amen.

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Written by Nanette Sawyer, Associate Pastor for Discipleship and Small Group Ministry

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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