Prayer for Guidance in Perplexity
“Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto You.” Psalm 143:8
O my Father, Your favor is life, Your loving-kindness is better than life. Your mercies have been new to me every morning, and Your faithfulness every night. You have watched over me from the earliest years of infancy, with more than a Father’s care. The kindness of the kindest on earth, has been coldness itself — when compared with Yours. I rejoice that I can thus trace in a wondrous past — the visible footsteps of Your love, and fearlessly trust and repose in You for the future.
You are a rich provider. None so able, none so willing . . .
to guide me in every perplexity,
to extricate me from every difficulty, and
to befriend me amid the fitful changes of life.
What a safe anchorage is this, amid the world’s restless surges of vicissitude, “The Lord reigns!” Enable me wholly to follow the Lord my God; to follow You not only in smooth places — but even when the path is rough, and the way thorny. May I confide in the wisdom of all Your allotments. I rejoice that all the changes You order for Your covenant people — are changes for the better, and not for the worse.
O blessed Jesus! You who are the true pillar of cloud by day, and of fire by night — precede me ever in all my wilderness wanderings. May I encamp only where You lead me. May I strike my tent only when You speak that I “go forward.” Let me experience the conscious happiness of knowing no will but Yours, and of being solicitous in all things to follow the guiding voice and footsteps of the Great Shepherd of the flock. If there is anything in Your providence perplexing me now, I would say in child-like simplicity, “I am oppressed, undertake for me!” “My heart is overwhelmed, lead me to the Rock that is higher than I.” Hide me in the crevices of that smitten Rock; let me know the safety and joy of being shielded there, until earth’s calamities be over and past.
Graciously forgive all the sins of this past day — the sins of thought, word and deed; all my selfishness and uncharitableness; all my pride and vain-glory; all my censoriousness and inconsideration of the wishes and feelings of others. Blessed Jesus! let me follow Your holy footsteps more closely, and drink of Your heavenly spirit more deeply.
Bless all Your people in sorrow, sanctify their trials to them — may they see and own a “needs be” in them all. Prepare the dying for death, and spare useful lives.
Take all belonging to me this night under the shield of Your protecting providence, let them ever commit their way unto You, and bring it to pass. Hold up their goings in Your word, that their footsteps may not stumble.
Watch over me during the unconscious hours of sleep; and when all my days and nights on earth are finished, may it be mine to enjoy Your presence in a cloudless, nightless Heaven! Through Jesus Christ, my blessed Lord and Savior. Amen.
“Let my prayer be set forth before You as incense — and the lifting up of my hands, as the evening sacrifice.”
-John MacDuff
