Sunday, June 19

The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime (pp. 93-94)

To read today's office, click here.

Happy Father's Day to all fathers who might come upon this blogsite!

The Prayer appointed for the Week is always a highlight for me. Today's prayer is apposite the entire office, which is dedicated to the theme of God's provisions for us and our need to trust in God to supply -- which is easy when we have supplies, easy to talk about when we might not have supplies, but very difficult when the supplies are running low.

God's provisions for us are not to be seen as the dispensing of gifts by some unknown god or by some rich estate manager who happens to dole out things now and again in order to keep the rabble quiet. Instead, our Prayer today equates God's provisions with his "loving-kindness." It reads: "For you never fail to help ... those whom you have set upon the sure foundation of your loving-kindness." The foundation upon which we are placed, placed as gently as a father placing a child into a bed of comfort or onto his back as he carries the child through the city, is the foundation of loving-kindness.

For this reason, the response we are to have for God's gracious provision is to ask God to give us "perpetual love and reverence for your holy Name." The response of a child of God to a God who has placed that child on the sure foundation of his perpetual loving-kindness is the response of loving God back. As John said, We love because God first loved us.