When Your Past Self Talks to Your Present Self in Prayer

Earlier this year, I was asked to write a month's worth of prayers for the devotional book Bread for the Day.  I wrote about that process here.  Last week, I got my first look at the prayers in print.

As part of my payment, I got two copies of the book.  Immediately, I turned to the August section, the prayers that I wrote months ago, prayers for August 2012.  I gave the other copy to my spouse, who also flipped to August.  We each read some of the August prayers out loud.

I felt tears welling up.  Last week was one of those hectic work weeks, where I had more work than I had time to do it, where I had to redo work that I'd submitted months ago--ah, the Penelope aspect of my job, where I weave one day, only to unweave at night.

The prayers that I'd written back in March really spoke to me last week when I read them out loud.  They were prayers for parched people, prayers that asked for deliverance.  I hardly remembered writing them in terms of specific details, but I was happy and comforted to see them again.

Here's an example, a prayer I wrote for August 18, a prayer that seems appropriate for the last month of summer during a time of climate transition (I predict that the summer months will stretch so that for many of us, August will one day be the middle of summer, not the near-end).

Creator God, we live in a time of drought. Our circumstances leave us parched and thirsty. You have promised us a spring of living water. Replenish our depleted wells. Leave them overflowing with wet promise.