Posts Tagged: Serenity Prayer

“LOVING GOD, MYSELF, AND OTHERS IN AN AS-IS WORLD”

On June 12, 2017 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

Today, my twelve-step affirmation is as follows:

“Today, by God’s grace, I will do one good thing, do it as well as it deserves to be done, and then move on to the next good thing.  Good things fall under three broad categories:

  1. Good things that express my love and respect for God directly to God.
  2. Good things that express my love and respect toward other people and all of creation.
  3. Good things that express my love and respect toward myself.”

The first and third category are the hardest to understand.  What does God really need?  God seems pretty self-sufficient to me.

However, God might not need anything from me, but he might enjoy some things from me.  It is a beautiful dawning to what promises to be a hot summers day.  I feel that God would enjoy it if I took a walk with God.  So, I will!

But for me, the second category is the easiest to understand, and the most difficult to do.  I like people, as long as they do precisely what I want.  (They almost never do.)  I like creation and reality, as long as creation and reality conform to my fantasies.  (They almost never do.)

Have you ever been to a used car lot, and seen a sticker on a car that read AS IS”?  That means that the car has no warranty.  As the old saying goes, “Ya pays your money, and ya takes your chances!”

All of life, every day and every relationship is “AS IS.”

And God is as God is.  God is abundant and complex, but God is not a smorgasbord.

The serenity prayer is well-known, even beyond twelve-step programs.  However, there is a longer version that is beautifully true, though less well known.  Here it is.  Pray this prayer today, and I’ll try to do the same!

”

God, grant me the Serenity
To accept the things I cannot change…
Courage to change the things I can,
And Wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace.
Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is,
Not as I would have it.
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His will.
That I may be reasonably happy in this life,
And supremely happy with Him forever in the next.
Amen.“

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“Toward a More Civil Approach to One Another”

On November 10, 2016 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

I have not been very civil here of late.  That is putting it mildly!  The other night, I went off verbally on one of my coworkers at the restaurant, and even threw a soggy, dirty cleaning cloth at him.

That is not civil discourse!

Do you ever find it difficult to remain courteous toward those with whom you disagree, or those whom you think are being unkind?  I believe that I detect a spike in a lack of civility in our society as a whole.  Perhaps I’m mistaken, though.  Perhaps it’s just me.

I’m not sure if all the election news in the past year or so has caused, exacerbated, or merely reflected this lack of civility.  Perhaps election news (and the election itself) has done all three.

I do know this for sure: I can’t directly affect the civility of other people or the nation , but I can get my own lack of civility under God’s control—and my control.

How do I plan to do that?  I’m not sure that I have a plan, but I do have some random thoughts.

First, I need to remember that my worth is not measured by what people say to me or about me.  I find that most of my lack of civility is triggered by people who speak rudely to me.  The truth is that I am thin-skinned.  Perhaps the reason one particular political figure irritates me so much is that I see myself in him—and I don’t like what I see!  I say that my worth comes from God.  Perhaps I should begin to believe that, and act on that belief.

Second, when I have feelings of being under attack, I need to stop and think.  What is the proper response here?  Nuclear reactors can be dangerous.  So can human reactors.  A thoughtful (and gentle) response is always better than a quick come-back.

Third, I can pray the serenity prayer.  I have a tendency to pray that prayer when I’m already pretty serene.  It is more important to pray the serenity prayer when I’m not in a serene situation.

Well, there it is: my blog for today.  I greatly fear that it is more a confessional than a blog post.

 

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