A candle doesn't choose where it shines.

O Christ, my Lord, again and again
I have said with Mary Magdalene,
'They have taken away my Lord
and I know not where they have laid him.'
I have been desolate and alone.
And thou hast found me again, and I know
that what has died is not thou, my Lord,
but only my idea of thee,
the image which I have made to preserve
what I have found, and to be my security.
I shall make another image, O Lord,
better than the last.
That too must go, and all successive images,
until I come to the blessed vision of thyself,
O Christ, my Lord. -George Appleton

In times of doubts and questionings, when our belief is perplexed by new learning, new teaching, new thought, when our faith is strained by creeds, by doctrines, by mysteries beyond our understanding, give us the faithfulness of learners and the courage of believers in thee; give us boldness to examine and faith to trust all truth; patience and insight to master difficulties; stability to hold fast our tradition with enlightened interpretation to admit all fresh truth made known to us, and in times of trouble, to grasp new knowledge readily and to combine it loyally and honestly with the old; alike from stubborn rejection of new revelations, and from hasty assurance that we are wiser than our fathers.
Save us and help us, we humbly beseech thee, O Lord.
-Bishop George Ridding, 1828-1904

An exercise.

 

This post is nothing more than jogging that first mile after you've taken a few weeks off.

You've enjoyed sleeping in, but in pampering your body, you notice that you're muscles are weakening. Slowly, perhaps against your will, the thirst to breathe deeply replaces snoring, and the comfort of a feathered blanket yearns to be traded for a cramp in the side.