Join Us For Family Devotions

We’re glad you can join us for breakfast and family devotions this Valentine’s Day. Christina has taken it upon herself to create a special atmosphere by making placemats out of Valentine napkins, hanging hearts, displaying cards, and putting a pink scarf on Chelsea. Hope you are hungry, too. Diana has prepared a delicious breakfast of grapefruit, eggs, bacon, fresh coffee cake and of course a cup of Irish breakfast tea. Sit back, eat slowly, listen to the fountain, enjoy the sun streaming into the room and relax.

While you finish your second cup, I’m going to read from 1 Corinthians 13. Let this description of pure love sink into your mind and heart as I read. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

It occurs to me that the only way to love in this way is as the Spirit transforms our hearts in humility. The Anonymous Prayer For Grace brings this into focus for us.

Deliver me Jesus
from the desire of being loved;
from the desire of being praised;
from the desire of being preferred to others;
from the desire of being consulted;
from the desire of being approved;

from the fear of being humiliated;
from the fear of being despised;
from the fear of being suffering rebuke;
from the fear of being forgotten;
from the fear of being wrong;
from the fear of being suspected.

And Jesus, grant me the grace to desire
that others might be loved more than I;
that others might be esteemed more than I;
that in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I decrease;
that others may be chosen and I set aside;
that others may be praised and I unnoticed;
that others may be preferred to me in everything;
that others may become holier than I, provided that I become as holy as I should.