"O Lord, in the morning I will direct my prayer to You."
"For Your name's sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity; for it
is great."—Psalm 25:11
O God, I bless You that You have permitted me to lie down
in sleep, and to awake this morning in safety. You have dispersed the darkness
of another night—may no shadow of sin obscure the sunshine of Your favor and
love. May the returning light of day be to me the type and emblem of that
better radiance with which you visit the souls of Your people, when they are
enabled, in Jesus, to behold a pardoning God seated on a throne of
reconciliation and grace.
I come to You, acknowledging my transgressions in all their
heinousness. I have nothing to plead in extenuation. Warnings have been
abused, providences slighted, grace resisted, Your Spirit grieved. It is of
the Lord's mercies I am not consumed—that You have not long before now
consigned me, with all this load of unpardoned guilt, to that place where
pardon is unknown.
But I do rejoice to know that "there is forgiveness with
You, that You may be feared"—that I can bring my great sins to a great
Savior. May I be enabled to feel that this all-glorious name of a
reconciled God in Christ is "a strong tower," into which I may "run, and be
safe." Give me grace, in self-renouncing lowliness, to disown every other
ground of confidence or hope of mercy, and to cast myself, a broken-hearted,
humbled penitent, at the feet of Him on whom was laid the burden of all my
transgressions. May mine henceforth be the blessedness of those "whose
iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered." May life's joys be
sweetened, and life's sorrows sanctified, and life's terminating hour
gladdened, with the assurance, "I am at peace with my God." May Your favor
brighten every scene, and the sweet sense of Your reconciling love be
interfused with all my occupations. If sorrow should cloud or darken, may I be
brought to feel that there can be no true sorrow or disquietude to the soul
which has found its rest in the finished work of Jesus, and which has attained
that blessed peace here which is the prelude of glory hereafter.
Give me grace to walk more closely with You in the time to
come. Being forgiven much, may I love You all the more. May my life be one
habitual effort of self-crucifixion and sin-crucifixion, seeking to consecrate
my soul's best energies to Him who is willing to "blot out as a thick cloud"
all my transgressions. Overrule the discipline of Your providence for
promoting within me this death of sin, and this life of righteousness. Amid
earth's many disquietudes, its crosses and its losses, enable me with joy to
look forward to that blessed hour when there shall be no more sin, and
therefore no more sorrow—when every tear shall be wiped from every eye, and
when I shall be permitted to know all that is comprehended in the holy
beatitude, how "blessed" indeed are "the pure in heart," who are to "see
God."
Direct, control, suggest, this day, all my designs and
thoughts and actions, that every power of my body, and every faculty of my
mind, may unite in devotedness to Your sole service and glory. And all I ask
is for Jesus' sake. Amen.
"Cause me to hear Your loving-kindness in the morning, for
in You do I trust."