A Prayer on My 52nd Birthday

Christ Be My All

O’ Lord your love is found in the birth, life, suffering, death, resurrection and ascension of your Son. Your victory is my victory. Therefore, I renounce Satan and all his wiles and temptations. I pray for personal, experiential knowledge of you as my love, my companion, and my friend. Your holiness compared to my sinfulness is great, yet your grace is greater. Transform me into the likeness of your Son. Your love for me is unceasing, may my love for you be as relentless and continuous. On Golgotha, you demonstrated your love for me: you bore the judgment for all my sin and shame. May my every second of living, every thought in my brain, and every beat of my heart be dedicated to loving you. I reject the world’s values and false promises. Please Lord, walk by my side, speak to my heart, that my life might be a reflection of the righteous beauty of your Son; through Jesus Christ my Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

Christ is All

O Lover to the uttermost,

May I read the meltings of Thy heart to me

in the manger of Thy birth,

in the garden of Thy agony,

in the cross of Thy suffering,

in the tomb of Thy resurrection,

in the heaven of Thy intercession.

Bold in this thought I defy my adversary,

tread down his temptations,

resist his schemings,

renounce the world,

am valiant for truth.

Deepen in me a sense of my holy relationship to Thee,

as spiritual bridegroom,

as Jehovah’s fellow,

as sinners’ friend.

I think of Thy glory and my vileness,

Thy majesty and my meanness,

Thy beauty and my deformity,

Thy purity and my filth,

Thy righteouness and my iniquity.

Thou has loved me everlastingly, unchangeably,

may I love Thee as I am loved;

Thou hast given Thyself for me,

may I give myself to Thee.

Thou hast died for me,

may I live to Thee

in every moment of time,

in every movement of my mind,

in every pulse of my heart.

May I never dally with the world and its allurements,

but walk by Thy side,

listen to Thy voice,

be clothed with Thy grace,

and adorned with Thy righteousness.

Arthur Bennett, ed. Valley of Vision (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1975), 18.


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