Open our eyes

O God,
how can we whose minds are so unstable
keep our eyes focused on You,
so that we can do
what we see You doing
every day
and all around us?

For You fill our world
at every moment
with creatures
just like us,
falling into need and sin,
or arising out of it
following the call of life
that You’ve planted in us,
though we might not know it.

Your Word has been strewn among us,
seeking that fertile humus in which it can sprout,
grow and eventually bear fruit,
so that it does not return to You void.

Open our eyes, Lord,
to see the world as You see it,
at every moment, in every place
hearts crying out for mercy,
to receive it, but also to bestow it.

Show us, Father,
that we are not alone,
and that to show mercy
can be as humble as yielding to another’s infirmity,
to overlook our brother’s ignorance,
to forgive one who injures or insults us
before, or even without, being asked.

Help us to see
that mercy has no size limit,
large or small, visible or hidden.
It is an arrow that never fails to hit its mark.
That to stand confidently before Your seat of mercy
is to be merciful wherever we are,
just as You are merciful.

And to always pray
what we hear Jesus praying every day,
‘Father, forgive them,
for they do not know what they are doing.’
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Your mercies…

…Lord, Your mercies are what fill me with dread. You are not a God who is pleased with wickedness. Boasters collapse under Your scrutiny. But I, so great is Your love, may come to Your House, and before Your holy Temple bow down, in reverence to You.

Your love, Father, upholds all the world. You are not a God who like a watchmaker designs and builds a clock, winds it up, and then leaves it to tick out its time moment by moment while You go away to live Your real life.

You hold us and everything that is, suspended as thoughts in Your mind. You never cease thinking of us, You never cease loving us whom You call the apple of Your eye, You never give up on these thoughts of Yours whom You have endowed with freedom.

The whole world is bathed in Your blazing light, yet we still wander through it unseeing as blind men, thinking and doing deeds of darkness, while You follow us with Your eyes, waiting and watching to catch us when we fall.

Your mercies, Lord, Your mercies are so great, and so great your patience, Your long-suffering love, maintaining and renewing the world by the Word of Your command, that we do not notice, Your mercy is too great for us of small mercy.

I cross myself to confess that I am the reason You ascended the Cross of Your own free will, and I bend down to touch the earth before You to acknowledge that I am but dust, but You raise me up, You raise me up and straighten me when I am most afraid.

Come into Your own, Lord, come among us visibly, reveal Your power, grant pardon to us sinners by Your saving Presence, anoint us with the myrrh of gladness, Saviour of fugitives, for to You, to You alone, do we run, O God our God, hope of all the earth.

Glory to the Father, to the Son, and to the Spirit Holy, Triad One in essence, Eternal, YHWH, the only lover of mankind. Glory to You.
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