I have often found that prayers are hidden in the sights and sounds which are all around us —especially in the first Bible that is God's creation. They often evoke an awareness of movements deep within that part of us that we call the soul. Sometimes that awareness evokes words that have enough space for the spirit to move outward from the heart. So this prayer — and others like it — have been written first on my heart and then have taken form on the page. The prayers, which have been coming through me in these days, have been gifts to me more than products from me. As such, I have felt a responsibility to share them for whatever way they may be helpful to others. They come in phrases meant to be pondered in the same way one might engage Lectio Divina (a way of reading meditatively) — one phrase at a time — with space to pause. I have often found the pause, the space between the words, to be the space of a holy encounter beyond words.
Because I am drawn to the visual, especially as captured through the lens of my camera, I have found that these prayers often have a photographic partner. Sometimes, the photo inspires prayer, and at other times, prayer searches out the photo (of which I have more than 10,000 — thank you, iPhone.) I find that both have a way of speaking to my life, often in surprising ways.
This photo of a split tree, taken at a nearby park, reminded me of that experience of life where, despite one's relative youth, there are things that break us open. But the breaking is not the end. All things are held in the creative embrace of the Holy One, who is love all the time (my preferred way of referring to God). Sometimes, life may have dismembered us in some way. The prayer seeks a remembering — a healing that takes all that is broken and fashions a new wholeness, not of our own making.
I hope that in some way this prayer will cultivate in your heart and mind space for God's holy love to heal and form you from the inside out.
A Prayer for When Life Is Splitting Apart=
-DMLH August, 2020
Re-member me, O Love,
For the soul-splitting scenes
Of the inhumane
Foster a forgetfulness
Of the gift you offer
In every moment
Every breath
Every pause
That carries the cosmos.
Re-member me, O Love,
For the fragments
Of a world exploding
In selfishness and fear
Often penetrate my heart
My thinking and my life.
Re-member me, O Love,
And take the yearning
Of my heart and mind
And fashion in me a yes
To your yes,
Too beautiful to ignore
Too strong to reject
Too lovely to deny.
Re-member me, O Love,
And form in me
Your new creation
Joined by your
Ligament of love
To the body of
Of the world.
Yes, re-member me, O Love,
That I may remember You
And discover again and again
Your power to make
All things new.
