Tag: complacency

Prayer against complacency

The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in the Thirty-Second Week of Ordinary Time, Year II, 08 November 2022
Titus 2:1-8, 11-14   ><]]]'> + <'[[[>< === ><]]]'> + <'[[[><   Luke 17:7-10
Lord Jesus Christ,
as we approach the end of the year
before we get carried away
with the excitement of your birthday
that is Christmas, help me focus on you
more earnestly these days.
Do not let me be complacent.

Jesus said to the Apostles: “Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, ‘Come here immediately and take your place at table?’ When you have done all you have been commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.'”

Luke 17:7, 10
Forgive me, Jesus
when there are times I feel so entitled
to you after I have done your assigned
task and mission;
let me keep in my mind always
that more than fulfilling the will of the Father,
what matters most is our relationship with God.

Do not let me be complacent in being good,
in being faithful,
in being a good example to others
as St. Paul instructed Titus
to remind everyone,
both the elder men and women,
 and younger men and women too!

For the grace of God has appeared, saving all and training us to reject godless ways and worldly desires and live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age, as we await the blessed hope, the appearance of the glory of the great God and of our savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to deliver us from all lawlessness and to cleanse for himself a people as his own, eager to do what is good.

Titus 2:11-14
Keep me temperate,
dignified, self-controlled,
sound in faith, love and endurance,
showing myself as a model of good deeds
in every respect, with integrity in teaching,
dignity, and sound speech 
that cannot be
criticized.
Amen.

Please bother us, Lord

The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday in the Sixteenth Week of Ordinary Time, 21 July 2022
Jeremiah 2:1-3, 7-8, 12-13   ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'>   Matthew 13:10-17
Photo by author, Garden of Gethsemane, Israel, 2019.

This word of the Lord came to me: Go cry out this message for Jerusalem to hear! I remember the devotion of your youth, how you loved me as a bride, following me in the desert, in a land unsown. the priests asked not “Where is the Lord?” Those who dealt with the law knew me not: the shepherds rebelled against me. The prophets prophesied by Baal, and went after useless idols.

Jeremiah 2:1-2, 8
Forgive us, O God our Father
for being so complacent,
for not being bothered at all
with how things are now going
on with our lives in relation with
you.
We have lost any sense at all
of you, Father that we do not seem
to care at all!
We have presumed you will 
understand us.
Worst of all, we are not bothered at
all that you know the sins we have been
committing, the evils we have been
harboring within.
Please disturb us, Lord,
when we play gods,
when we insult you of not
knowing what we have been
doing and thinking;
Please disturb us, Lord,
to wonder where are you,
to always seek you
most especially in the most
ordinary things in life like
the parables of Jesus;
Please disturb us, Lord,
when we feel self-sufficient,
when we feel secured,
when we feel we know everything;
Please disturb us, Lord,
because when we are no longer
disturbed on you and your
whereabouts, that is when we 
have gone far astray from you,
when we "indeed hear but not understand,
and look but never see" (Mt.13:14).
Amen.