For a Busy Day'.

A Morning Prayer for a Busy or Troubled Week-day

"Let the morning bring me word of Your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in You. Show me the way I should walk, for to You I lift up my soul. Rescue me from my enemies, O Lord, for I hide myself in You. Teach me to do Your will, for you are my God; may your gracious Spirit lead me on level ground. For Your name's sake, O Lord, preserve my life; in Your righteousness, bring me out of trouble." Psalm 143:8-11

The sweetest flower needs heaven's sunshine and dew—to perfect its beauty and sustain its life. So does the holiest human life need God. A picture without sky in it is incomplete. Just so, a day on earth without a glimpse of heaven to brighten it, dies without a blessing. We rob our own heart and impoverish our life—if we do not avail ourselves of the help and renewal which we may get through prayer. Prayer lifts us into the very presence of God. It brings down upon us the power of Christ, according to the measure of our need, and the measure of our faith. He who lives without prayer—lives without God. He who lives a life of prayer—walks with God by day and by night. The more we have to do, and the more care we have—the more do we need to begin our days with prayer!

No day starts well without its morning prayer. We need to get the touch of Christ's hand upon us, to give us calmness and strength as we go forth.

There is a story of a Christian woman whose life was full of tasks and cares. One morning she had been unusually hurried in getting her household ready for the day, and she had not kept quiet and sweet through it all. She had lost patience and had become fretted and vexed. Her heart had been in a fever of disquiet all the morning.

When the children were off for school and the pressing tasks were finished, the tired woman went to her own room. She was discouraged. The day had begun most unsatisfactorily. She took up her Bible and read the story of the healing of the sick woman, "He touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose, and ministered unto them."

"If I could have had that cooling, healing touch on my hand," she said, "before I began my morning's work, the fever would have left me, too, and then I could have ministered sweetly to my household." She had learned that the first touch in the morning, should be Christ's. We need his healing touch, before we are ready for any true serving.

This is especially true of our week-days. We can get along better on Sunday. The air is clearer and heaven seems nearer. We rest from the tasks and toils which ofttimes so fill and overfill our hands on the other days. We do not have to go out into the noisy world to endure its frictions and strifes, and take part in its rivalries and competitions. We can stay at home, in love's quiet shelter, on Sundays, and go to God's house, which is a sanctuary for our souls, a quiet and still resting-place. It is not so hard for most of us to live sweetly and victoriously on Sunday.

But the week-days try us. Many of us have to rise early and hurry away to work which is ofttimes hard, and which sometimes irks us. Perhaps we are thrown among people who are not kindly and congenial, who sorely try us and sometimes fret us by their spirit that is unrefined, their talk that is indecent, and their conduct that is distasteful. Perhaps the days bring their temptations, requiring us to be continually under sore restraint, lest we yield and say words we ought not to say. It may be that the grinding pressure of the day is too great for our strength, that the burdens are too heavy, the tasks too hard, the hours too long. Some of us must work under masters who are not always gentle and thoughtful, who exact more than is just, and who are lacking in sympathy and human feeling. Some of us have to contend all the day with discouraging conditions in business, meeting losses and sustaining reverses.

It is our week-days, which test us. Many of us find it much harder to keep sweet and patient and at peace then, than on the quiet Sundays. Then we are within the gates of the refuge, with the dangers and troubles shut out; on the week-days we are out in the open, unsheltered field, where storms beat and suns smite and perils sweep unhindered. The Sundays are oases, with their wells of water and their palm-trees; the week-days are desert, with waterless sands, shadeless stretches, and torrid winds.

In an old psalm there is a prayer that is most fitting for the morning of a busy weekday. It is not new—but human hearts change not, human needs are the same in all centuries, and therefore this prayer which no doubt brought blessing to a struggling life, when first offered long ago, may bring blessing into struggling lives any of these modern days. The prayer runs thus, "Let the morning bring me word of Your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in You. Show me the way I should walk, for to You I lift up my soul. Rescue me from my enemies, O LORD, for I hide myself in You. Teach me to do Your will, for you are my God; may your gracious Spirit lead me on level ground. For Your name's sake, O LORD, preserve my life; in Your righteousness, bring me out of trouble." Psalm 143:8-11

If we will make this prayer our own, it will bring blessing and peace into our heart through the most troubled week-days. There are six petitions in the prayer.

1. To Hear God's Voice First

"Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you." This is a prayer that the first voice to break upon our ear at the opening of the day, shall be the voice of God, speaking in love. We ought to try to see Christ's face—before we look upon any human face, when we awake in the morning. Drummond says, "Five minutes spent in the companionship of Christ, every morning—yes, two minutes, if it is face to face and heart to heart—will change your whole day, will make every thought and feeling different, will enable you to do things for his sake—which you would not have done for your own sake, or for any one's sake."

Perhaps not sufficient use is made of the Bible in the ordinary devotions of Christian people. It is not enough to speak to God, telling him of our needs, our dangers, our sins, our troubles, and to plead with him for help, for favor, for comfort. We must also listen to God speak to us, and we must be quiet that we may hear what He has to say. We must feed our souls on His holy Word. No exercise of devotion is complete, without the reading of some verse or verses which will start inspiring thoughts in our minds. If nothing more is possible, we should take at least a verse for the day. This will prove a blessing through all the hours. It will start a song in our heart, in the early morning, which will go singing until nightfall. It will bring a fragment of heaven down into our common life, to brighten it, and to become impulse, cheer, comfort, encouragement, and hope for us—when cares and duties grow burdensome. It will give us a definite lesson to master for the day; it will set a standard before us toward which to strive; it will speak to us a word of counsel to make the way plainer for our feet; it will become a lamp to shine on our path to show us how to walk.

It is sweet to look into Christ's face in the first waking moment, to thank him for his love, to receive his smile of forgiveness and peace and his blessing for the day. It prepares us for duty. It gives us fresh courage. "Those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength." After our little time with God in the morning, we are ready for anything the day may bring, and need dread no possible experience.

It was said that when the rays of morning broke over the plains of ancient Egypt, the harp of Memnon, held in the hands of the famous statue at Thebes, poured out soft, sweet music on the air. The waves of morning light made the music, as they swept gently over the chords of the harp. When the beams of God's loving-kindness touch our hearts at the early dawn, they should start songs of gladness, joy, and peace.

A strange instrument hung on an old castle wall—so the legend runs. No one knew how to use it. Its strings were broken and covered with the dust of many years. Those who looked at the instrument wondered what it was, and what purpose it had served. One day a stranger came to the castle gate and entered the hall. His eye noted the harp on the wall, and, taking it down, he reverently brushed away the dust and tenderly reset the broken strings. The chords long silent, woke beneath his skillful touch, and all who heard the music were thrilled by it. It was the master, long absent, who had come back again to his castle!

It is only a legend—but it is a legend with a meaning. In every human soul, there hangs a marvelous harp, dust-covered, with strings jangled and broken, until the Master comes, and with his own hand mends the broken harp and strikes it with his own fingers.

If we would have a day of songful life—we must open our heart every morning to the Master, Christ. He will repair the strings which sin has broken and put them in tune, and then will sweep them with his skillful fingers. Then we can go forth to experiences of peace and blessing. When the song of God's love is singing in our soul we are ready for the new day.

2. For Divine Guidance

The second petition of this morning prayer is, "Show me the way I should walk." We cannot know the way ourselves. The path across one little day seems very short—but none of us can find it ourselves. Each day is a hidden world to our eyes, as we enter it in the morning. We cannot see one step before us, as we go forth. An impenetrable veil covers the brightest day, as with night's black robes. It may have joys and prosperities for us, or it may bring to us sorrows and adversities. Our path may lead us into a garden, or the garden may be a Gethsemane. We have our plans as we go out in the morning—but we are not sure that they will be realized. The day will bring duties, responsibilities, temptations, perils, tangles which our fingers cannot unravel, intricate or obscure paths in which we cannot find the way.

What could be more fitting in the morning than the prayer, "Show me the way I should walk"? God knows all that is in the day for us. His eye sees to its close—and he can be our guide. There is no promise given more repeatedly in the Bible, than that of divine guidance. We have it in the shepherd psalm, "He leads me in the paths of righteousness." Paths of righteousness are right paths. Of course, God will never lead us in any wrong or sinful way. That is one meaning. All God's paths are clean and holy. They are the ways of His commandments. But there is another sense in which they are right paths. They are the right ways, the best ways for us. Ofttimes they are not the ways which we would have chosen. They do not seem to be good ways. But nevertheless they are right, and lead to blessing and honor. We are always safe, therefore, in praying this prayer on the morning of any day, "Show me the way I should walk."

God has many ways of answering this prayer. When we ask him to show us the road—He puts his Word into our hands, and says, "Take, and read."The Bible is of use to us only when we read it and ponder its teachings, and then set ourselves to obey it. This suggests again the importance of reading the Bible in our morning devotions. Otherwise, how shall we learn what God would say to us in answer to our prayer?

There are other ways. Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father. No matter through what source, or at the lips of what messenger, the counsel or the wisdom comes—it is from God. When you are in some perplexity about duty, and pray that God would cause you to know the way in which you should walk, you may find the answer in a book whose words, as you read them, make the way plain and clear to you. Or you may find it in the quiet words of a friend to whom you turn with your question. Happy are the young people who, in their days of inexperience, when all life is yet new—have a wise older friend to whom they may go with perfect trust with the questions that must always arise. Far more than we realize, does God show us the way through human guides. He thus hides himself in the love and wisdom, of those who are dear to us.

It is from the mother that the little child receives the answer to this prayer. "God could not be everywhere present—and therefore he made mothers," said the old rabbis. Teachers come after our mothers, as the guides of our youth. Then all through the days, God reveals himself in the lives of those who touch us with their love, and influence us through their wisdom and goodness. In the olden days angels came to tell men what God would have them do. No doubt they come yet, ministering unseen and unheard, whispering in our ears many a suggestion which sets our feet in safe and right paths. Yet there are human angels—for angels are only God's messengers, those whom he sends.

God answers our prayer also in his providences. One day after you have prayed your morning prayer, you are sent in from your busy life, to lie down on a sick-bed; probably you do not think of this as God's answer to your request to be shown the way—but it is so. Your path leads into the shadows, and you must suffer a while. No doubt this is the right way. You are learning some lesson that you could not have learned out in the crowded street, in the open field, or in the busy mart.

There are certain song-birds which are taught new songs by being shut up for a time in the darkness. Another bird with the song that is to be learned, is brought and placed near the little prisoner, where it sings its sweet notes over and over. The bird in the darkness listens, catches the song, learns it; and when it is taken out into the light, it knows the new song and sings it everywhere. So God ofttimes takes his children into the darkness, that he may teach them some song they would not learn in the busy world. In the shadows of the sick-room, they hear the sweet things they are to learn.

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