A Prayer of Good Work

[prismaticbleed]

God, thank You for using ordinary, everyday people for Your Glory. Thank You for using the rejects, outcasts, & nobodies of the world for Your Good Purposes. Thank You for working in me, too— freak and failure though I may feel. Nevertheless, I wouldn't be praying right now if You hadn't called me. I wouldn't even have this blessed faith in You if You hadn't graced me with it.

As incredible as it sounds, You chose me for Yourself even before the beginning of time. When the world was barren, still unformed, still chaotic... even then, when You spoke Light and Order into existence, the germ of my own existence was seeded. The same goes for every other human being that has ever lived. In the very beginning, You had us pictured in Your Heart. We were the artwork You yearned to complete. But even now, billions of years after that initial idea, that ancient affection, You are still working on Your masterpieces. Even in this very moment, You look at me with a painter's Eye, and reach out to me with a Sculptor's touch, always improving the aesthetic of my soul to match Yours all the more.

Thinking about this amazing truth, I can genuinely believe that You do have a unique plan and purpose for my life, something truly Good and Holy, something I CANNOT foil. No matter how often I stumble in weakness, on imperfect footing, with lingering blindness— as long as I turn back to You, my Creator, my Artist, my Father, You can and will correct, restore, strengthen, and guide me. Your work, both on and in me, is not done, not until I am made perfect in You, by You— and that Work cannot be stopped. I thank You profusely for that.

Even so, Lord, I pray: please continue to work at sanctifying my life today.  May I be receptive & responsive to each Word of Yours, to every touch of Your Hand, however quiet & soft they may be. Make me constantly attentive and attuned to Your Grace.
Work in me to cut away the rusty rot of vice & error, to remove all parasitic excess & unnatural growth, to carefully & colorfully repaint me where I have been worn down to the bone, and to tenderly recast & reconnect the vital pieces that have been broken off from me.
Work through me to bring about Your Kingdom even in my tiny corner of the world. May I represent You as Your Creation, signed with Your Name, to honor & praise & adore You in every circumstance without exception. May every instant of my life be lived for You, and because of You. You are my Everything. Please saturate every heartbeat I have with that everlasting love.

I pray this in the name of Jesus, the perfect standard and Your Word Incarnate, Who has Himself embraced me to grow ever closer in likeness to Him, until the day He returns and that most joyous ideal is completed, as I rest entire in Him at last. Amen.