Rejoice and Praise

Reflections on faith, hope, and the quiet journey with Christ

There are moments when loving another person is easy.

And there are moments when it is not.

Sometimes another person’s words or actions strike something within us, and anger rises before we have even had time to think. We want to defend ourselves. We want to answer immediately. We want the other person to understand exactly why they are wrong.

Today was one of those days for me.

I was angry.

And perhaps the prayer is not that I never become angry, but that anger does not decide who I become in the moment.

Lord, Help Me Love the Unlovable

Lord, help me love the unlovable,
to respect those who act
and think differently from me.

Help me to keep my soul and heart pure
amid the sharp shards,
amid the slings and arrows
directed at me.

Help me to breathe.

Help me to count to ten
before the rising fury within me explodes
in shades of vermillion red
and canary yellow.

Let not the anger within me
become the blackness of charcoal
roughly smudged against a page—

anger pressed hard into the paper,
the violence of the heart
leaving its mark.

Help me to hear You, O Lord.

Help me to pray
for calmness and peace.

Let not the light within me be marred
by the iniquity around me.

Let not the darkness
strangle the goodness
out of my soul.

Remind me that I cannot always choose
what another person says or does.

But somewhere between the anger
and my response,
there is still freedom.

There is still grace.

There is still You.

And perhaps loving someone
does not always mean liking them.

Perhaps respect does not require agreement.

Perhaps sometimes love is simply refusing
to return the sharp shard
that has wounded me.

Lord, when anger rises within me,
help me not to become
the very thing that has angered me.

Keep my heart open.

Keep my words measured.

Keep the light alive within me.

And when I cannot do this by myself—

Lord, help me.


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