a diary of private prayer by john baillie. an evening prayer from the seventeenth day. 1949.

i bless Thee, O most holy God, for the unfathomable love whereby Thou hast ordained that the spirit with spirit can meet and that I, a weak and erring mortal, should have this ready access to the heart of Him who moves the stars.
With bitterness and true compuction of heart I acknowledge before Thee the gross and selfish thoughts that I so often allow to enter my mind and to influence my deeds.
I confess, O God- that often I let my mind wander down unclean and forbidden ways: that often I deceive myself as to where my plain duty lies: that often, by concealing my real motives, I pretend to be better than I am: that often my honesty is only a matter of policy: that often my affection for people is only a refined form of caring for myself: that often my sparing of my enemy is due to nothing more than cowardice: that often I do good deeds only that they may be seen of people, and shun evil ones only because I fear they may be found out.
O holy One, let the fire of Thy love enter my heart, and burn up all this coil of meanness and hypocrisy, and make my heart as the heart of a little child.
Give me grace, O God, to pray now with pure and sincere desire for all those with whom I have had to do this day. Let me remember now my friends with love and my enemies with forgiveness , entrusting them all, as I now entrust my own soul and body, to Thy protecting care; through Jesus Christ. Amen.

_______________this book spoke to me alot as far as prayer goes. its honest and sometimes even relates to my heart in a painfully obvious way.


i'm sitting in my classroom at my desk right now, music playing, hearing kids running and screaming in the halls as well as teachers yelling. this is my life. then i get off work and meander about... finishing schoolwork and meeting up with people. read. laugh. cry. pray. drive. sit. walk. run. go to bed. occasionally shower. then i get up and come here and teach kids how to create art. and we talk about life and love and stuff i didn't know about when i was their age. and hug and hug and hug. this is what i do. everyday, five days every week.
but in the midst of all of this, god has been stirring so much up in my heart the past month. stirring up and ripping up and cleaning up. i am on overload. a heavier overload than i've ever known. and i don't write this for any reason other than... i just got done reading some blogs that were brutal. honest even if it didn't sound great or poetic or pretty. and i wondered why i'm not that way. maybe i don't feel like being that way in blogworld. thats okay, right? yes. there's no reason for the world to know exactly how my heart feels. but today...something made me desire this reflection.
it's not that i dont reflect on a regular basis. my journals pages are covered with page after page of chicken scratches of joy or through tears. i over reflect and over and over and over. i worry about it to the point that i have taken every single part of my heart and my life into my own hands. i take them from god and then wonder why he's not doing anything. so i give them back and take them, and give and take and give and take. i'm impatient. i'm selfish. and i lack knowledge on the true character of this god that i supposedly love. if i knew who he really was and believed it, i wouldn't be the way that i am. i wouldn't live in fear. i wouldn't treat people that i love the way that i do. i would trust Him more.
i don't know how to love well.
i try to take so many situations into my own hands. if i see any problems, for some reason think it's my responsibility to let people know and try to fix it. i forget that Jesus can intercede much more effectively with his gentle heart than i can with my fretful judgement and hypocrisy. i forget that the lord is near and so in control. i forget his gentle spirit. his gentle strength is moderated by this love that i can't understand.
something that i need. gentleness.
i need alot of stuff. i need love. i need truth. i don't even know who to believe anymore. i can't listen to anything or anyone without questioning it's validity and it's accordance with scripture. i want truth so desperately. i feel attacked by evil often. sometimes i feel lied to. i feel deceived. i fear everything. things that shouldn't be feared. my heart is anxious. even when i know Jesus says "don't let your hearts be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and petition present your requests to god" and then he tells us of this peace that goes beyond anything that our minds could understand. it makes so much sense to me and it sounds glorious. but somedays my heart just can't get there no matter how desperately i want it to be there.
i'm realizing self deception & that i don't know this God as well as i thought. or as well as i want to...or need to. i'm realizing my choosing of the worse when i know the better. i'm realizing my failure to apply to myself the standards of life that i often demand of others. i'm realizing this slowness to see the good in others and to see the evil in myself. i'm realizing that i speak and act outside of love often. love: the greatest commandment. i'm not as good of a friend or sister or daughter or teacher or leader as i once thought. i'm realizing my hardness of heart and the pride that keeps it from recognizing these things. depraivity.
sometimes it takes your life being completely displaced if knowing God better requires it.
i don't know that i've ever wanted God more than i do now. sometimes wanting God hurts. sometimes it feels so good.
i want to know God deeper than i knew was possible. i don't want my mind or my days to be wholly occupied with this world's passing show. i want to step into this show, consumed with something so much greater, so that it's not me stepping in at all, but only His lovingkindness inside of me giving me power to lift my mind to the contemplation of things unseen and eternal. forbid that i should stay content with the things of sense and time. rather that the lord would grant me something to strengthen my hold on this unseen world, so to increase my sense of its reality and to attach my heart to its holy interests that, as the end of my earthly life draws nearer, i may not grow to be a part of these fleeting surroundings but rather more and more conformed to this kingdom that my God so often speaks of.