Same Old Same Old

It is not the arithmetic of our prayers, how many they are: nor the rhetoric of our prayers, how eloquent they are; nor the geometry of our prayers, how long they be; nor the music of our prayers, how sweet our voice may be; nor the logic of our prayers, how argumentative they may be; nor the method of our prayers, how orderly they may be -- which God cares for. Fervency of spirit is that which availeth much.

-- William Lee

17th Century Nun's Prayer

Lord, thou knowest better than I know myself that I am growing older and will some day be old. Keep me from the fatal habit of thinking I must say something on every subject and on every occasion. Release me from craving to straighten out everybody's affairs. Make me thoughtful but not moody; helpful but not bossy. With my vast store of widsom it seems a pity not to use it all, but Thou knowest Lord, that I want a few friends at the end.

Keep my mind free from the recital of endless details; give me wings to get to the point. Seal my

lips on my aches and pains. They are increasing and love of rehearsing them is becoming sweeter as the years go by. I dare not ask for grace enough to enjoy the tales of other's pains, but help me to endure them with patience. I dare not ask for improved memory, but for a growing humility and a lessening cocksureness when my memory seems to clash with the memories of others. Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally I may be mistaken.

Keep me reasonably sweet; I do not want to be a saint - some of them are so hard to live with

--but a sour old person is one of the crowning works of the Devil. Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places and talents in unexpected people. And, give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so.

Amen.

Why Do Our Prayers Seem To Disintegrate Toward Meaningless Prattle?

1. Talk about things that don’t matter.

Eye Contact with God – numbers in the elevators are there so that people don’t have to make eye contact. Sometimes our worship aids can be there for the very same reason. Rather than an aid they can become a deterrent – not the fault of the aid but a problem within our hearts. The desire to avoid the vulnerability that comes when we lay ourselves bare before God with no pretense, excuse or self-justification.

Look at Psalm 88. A Psalm for your encouragement. The lady was sick in the hospital and wondering where in the world God was. (Ill.) Unless we learn to communicate to God directly, honestly and in openness then we will never find meaningful relationship with Him.

Many years ago I decided to do that very thing. I was fed up with empty words and pharisaical phrases. In my search for new meaning, I came across this brief description of prayer, which I set on my desk and carried in the front of my Bible for years. I cannot locate the book from which it was taken, but I do know the author, a seventeenth- century Roman Catholic Frenchman named Francois Fenelon. Although written centuries ago, it has an undeniable ring of relevance:

Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one's heart, its pleasures and its pains, to a dear friend. Tell Him your troubles, that He may comfort you; tell Him your joys, that He may sober them; tell Him your longings, that He may purify them; tell Him your dislikes, that He may help you to conquer them, talk to Him of your temptations, that He may shield you from them; show Him the wounds of your heart, that He may heal them; lay bare your indifference to good, your depraved tastes for evil, your instability. Tell Him how self- love makes you unjust to others, how vanity tempts you to be insincere, how pride disguises you to yourself and to others.

If you thus pour out all your weaknesses, needs, troubles, there will be no lack of what to say. You will never exhaust the subject. It is continually being renewed. People who have no secrets from each other never want for subjects of conversation. They do not weigh their words, for there is nothing to be held back, neither do they seek for something to say. They talk out of the abundance of the heart, without consideration they say just what they think. Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God.

n Strengthening Your Grip, Charles Swindoll

2. A sense of futility about our prayers.

There are times when we really do not believe that it will make a difference if we pray. The evidence is in our prayerlessness.

Can we believe that God ever really modifies His action in response to the suggestions of men? For infinite wisdom does not need telling what is best, and infinite goodness needs no urging to do it. But neither does God need any of those things that are done by finite agents, whether living or inanimate. He could, if He chose, repair our bodies miraculously without food; or give us food without the aid of farmers, bakers, and butchers, or knowledge without the aid of learned men; or convert the heathen without missionaries. Instead, He allows soils and weather and animals and the muscles, minds, and wills of men to cooperate in the execution of His will... It is not really stranger, nor less strange, that my prayers should affect the course of events than that my other actions should do so. They have not advised or changed God' s mind -- that is, His overall purpose. But that purpose will be realized in different ways according to the actions, including the prayers, of His creatures.

... C. S. Lewis, The Efficacy of Prayer

What determines the power of a person's prayer?

Are there certain people who seem able to see results in their prayer lives more than others? Why or why not?

What is your response to the following quote from "Praying With Power"?

"How does the prayer action of human beings relate to the sovereignty of God? This is a key issue in understanding the difference between prayer in general and effective, fervent prayer.

When I was first moving deeply into my study and understanding of prayer some years ago, one of the statements that helped me most was a chapter title in Jck Hyford's book, Prayer is Invading the Impossible: If We Don't He Won't. Jack Hayford did not say, ‘If we don't He can't'. That would have been terrible theology. God is sovereign and He can do anything He wants to do. The sovereign God, however, apparently has chosen to order His creation in such a way that many of His actions are contingent on the prayers of His people. It is as if God has a Plan A He will implement if believers pray. If they do not, He has a Plan B. Plan A is obviously better for all concerned than Plan B. The choice, according to God's design is ours. If we choose to pray and if we pray powerfully, more blessing will come and God's kingdom will be manifested here on earth in a more glorious way than if we choose not to.

I love the way one of the great scholars of prayer of our generation, Richard Foster puts it: "We are working with God to determine the future. Certain things will happen in history if we pray rightly."

The notion that we are theologically healthier if we do not expect our prayers to be answered is alive and well. Nothing I am aware of contributes more to perpetuating rhetoric prayer. I was programmed in this way of thinking in my own preparation for the ministry, but I doubt that any of my professors were quite that outspoken.

A recent study by Margaret Poloma and George Gallup Jr. found that although 88% of Americans pray to God in some way or other, less than half of them (42%) ask Him for material things they might need. And only 15% regularly experience answers to specific prayer requests. One of the reasons so few practice "petitionary prayer" may well be that the theology that we shouldn't expect answers when we pray.

Poloma and Gallup found that "many who ask do receive that for which they have prayed." Their comment: "A modern and rational worldview may regard petitionary prayer as a form of magic, but it is a prayer form for which there are countless biblical examples."

I would add that a primary biblical example of praying for material things is the Lord's Prayer itself in which Jesus instructed us to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread" (Matt. 6:11)

As I recall I was taught in seminary that the most important function of prayer was to change me and mold me. God never changes. He is sovereign and he will do what he intends to do whether I pray or not. A saintly voice from yesteryear, that of R.A. Torrey, sounds as if it were speaking today. Torrey laments that churches in his day were not praying. Christians, he says, "believe in prayer as having a beneficial ‘reflex influence,' that is as benefitting the person who prays . . . but as for prayer bringing anything to pass that would not have come to pass if we had not prayed, they do not believe in it, and many of them frankly say so." Rhetoric prayer was common then as well.

We believe here that prayer changes things. How about engaging in this active form of prayer this week as we concentrate on the city sector on the back?

The excerpt above is taken from Peter Wagner's book "Churches That Pray, pps. 41,42

3. An underlying misconception that prayer is about our “getting” something other than the primary thing that God proposes to give which is himself and his wisdom. He is the gift and the reward of prayer. Even though we may give mental assent to this truth, a major source of disillusionment comes when we fail to receive from God. Contentment is one of the great pre-requisites of blessing.

I received a little printed form the other day with a rather intriguing title: How to Be Perfectly Miserable. And it goes on to list a few things you can do that will not only make you perfectly miserable but also keep you that way.

1. Think about yourself.

2. Talk about yourself.

3. Use the personal pronoun "I" as often as possible in your conversation.

4. Mirror yourself continually in the opinion of others.

5. Listen greedily to what people say about you.

6. Insist on consideration and respect.

7. Demand agreement with your own views on everything.

8. Sulk if people are not grateful to you for favors shown them.

9. Never forget a service you may have rendered.

10. Expect to be appreciated.

11. Be suspicious.

12. Be sensitive to slights.

13. Be jealous and envious.

14. Never forget a criticism.

15. Trust nobody but yourself.

See: Rom 12:3; 1 Cor 13:4-5

4. We say what we think He wants us to say. We fail to say to God what we are really feeling deep inside.

One of the small hurdles for me as a parent was coming to the place where I could encourage my children to talk to me. If I really want that – because of course this is a part of intimacy that ought to exist then I must brace myself as a parent for all sorts of things that I might not want to hear. And until I can accept the things that I don’t want to hear with grace, then I may never experience my children communicating with me from their hearts. God can take our honest communication – He longs for it. You will not offend Him by telling Him what is in your heart even though He knows it full well.

5. Treat prayer as an end rather than a means to the end of enhanced relationship and intimacy with God. This requires the discipline of listening to God.

I am relatively certain that there is no virtue in prayer by itself even as there is no virtue in conversation by itself. Talking is not a purposeful pursuit but relationship is. So the same is true in regard to prayer. There is nothing to be sought in merely talking at God. A relationship with Him is a worthy pursuit and prayer is a vital means to that end.

6. We try to influence the will of God without first surrendering our own to Him. How can we ever hope to influence God if we do not allow Him to influence us? Why should God care about what we want if we have no concern for what He wants. If our will is in rebellion with His will then prayer will be an unproductive effort in our own lives. It will certainly be a meaningless experience.. Did you ever try to talk to a person who has certain “taboo” areas? There are certain subjects of conversation that cannot be broached . . ..

Our Will – God’s Will

- Giving expression to our will even when it is in conflict with God’s will. People “prevail” with God. They persist until there is no other recourse – until they fully understand God’s pleasure. Sort of like the point where people release sick loved ones to God’s hands. To fail to do this is a relational mistake and it is a spiritual mistake as well. There should be no “taboo” areas between us and God. Like this discussions between us and our kids where we bring discussion deliberately to a close and refuse to hear anything further about it.

- Submission. Jesus prayed “nevertheless” not my will but thine be done. Until we can learn to operate in submission of course we do not understand the concept of submission (not gender specific). The greatest exercise in the world to produce an attitude of humility is, after representing yourself clearly, to proceed happily with someone else’s plans.

- Contentment. It is a place of positional blessing. Before we can truly experience God’s blessing in our lives this is a place that we must come to.

- PHP 4:10 I rejoice greatly in the Lord that at last you have renewed your concern for me. Indeed, you have been concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it. [11] I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. [12] I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. [13] I can do everything through him who gives me strength

7. We are de-motivated by the distance between what we are and what we ought to be and therefore we do little or nothing.

It’s the same sort of reaction to my saying to you, “We are going to run a marathon . . . “ Too far out of our reach – It has a very adverse effect on us.

“Our task is not to do what lies dimly in the distance but to do what lies clearly at hand.”

I believe that the Devil loves to minimize our efforts and to tell us that the little things don’t make any difference and that we are wasting our time to do those things.

Often it is the timely, little prayers breathed from the heart that hears the voice of God that are ultimately impacting.

8. Too much of a hurry.

A person who reads a book or who watches television or who glances at his watch is not usually interested in how his mind is organized and controlled by these events, still less in what idea of the world is suggested by a book, television, or a watch. But there are men and women who have noticed these things, especially in opur own times. Lewis Mumford, for example, has been one of our great noticers. He is not the sort of man who looks at a clock merely to see what time it is. Not that he lacks interest in the content of clocks, which is of concern to everyone from moment to moment, but he is far more interested in how a clock creates the idea of "moment to moment". He attends to the philosophy of clocks, to clocks as a metaphor, about which our education has had little to say and clockmakers nothing at all. "The clock," Mumford has concluded, "is a piece of power machinery whose `product' is seconds and minutes." In manufacturing such a product, the clock has the effect of disassociating time from human events and thus nourishes the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences. Moment to moment, it turns out, is not God's conception, or nature's. It is man conversing with himself about and through a piece of machinery he created.

In Mumford's great book Technics and Civilization, he shows how, beginning in the fourteenth century, the clock made us into time-keepers, and then time-savers, and now time-servers. In the process, we have learned irreverence toward the sun and the seasons, for in a world made up of seconds and minutes, the authority of nature is superseded. Indeed, as Mumford points out, with the invention of the clock, Eternity ceased to serve as the measure and focus of human events. And thus though few would have imagined the connection, the inexorable ticking of the clock may have had more to do with the weakening of God's supremacy than all the treatises produced by the philosophers of the enlightenment; that is to say, the clock introduced a new form of conversation between man and God, in which God appears to have been the loser. Perhaps Moses should have included another commandment: Thou shalt not make mechanical representations of time.

Did you ever try to talk to the person who is in a hurry? Fidgeting, distracted. You have the impression that you are keeping them from something more important. God’s work in our lives is accomplished in the “seasonal” times. The Bible tells us that those who “wait on the Lord” have their strength renewed. (God is phlegmatic.) God will always “release” the hurried soul to their more important concerns without interrupting them currently. And we continue uninterrupted until we have exhausted our own resources and come back to Him.

Many time the distance or the time between our prayers and the answers is the time required for God to prepare us for what we have asked for.

Call Time Out

I wasted an hour one morning beside a mountain stream,

I seized a cloud from the sky above and fashioned myself a dream,

In the hush of the early twilight, far from the haunts of men,

I wasted a summer evening, and fashioned my dream again.

Wasted? Perhaps. Folk say so who never have walked with God,

When lanes are purple with lilacs and yellow with goldenrod.

But I have found strength for my labors in that one short evening hour.

I have found joy and contentment; I have found peace and power.

My dreaming has left me a treasure, a hope that is strong and true.

From wasted hours I have built my life and found my faith anew.

See: Matt 14:23; Mark 1:35

9. Perhaps the coldness in our heart indicates something deeper. That we may never have sufficiently tired of our own self-directed, self-consumed ways and still down deep we believe God to be a Divine interruption to our plans, hopes and dreams.

There seems to come a time for many people when they are just tired of form and ritual and their hearts hunger for reality.

A Psalm of Singlemindedness

Lord of reality

make me real

not plastic

synthetic

pretend phony

An actor playing out his part

hyposrite.

I don't want

to keep a prayer list

but to pray

nor agonize to find your will

but obey

what I already know

to argue

theories of inspiration

but submit to your Word

I don't want

to explain the difference

between eros and philos

and agape

but to love

I don't want to sing

as if I mean it.

I want to mean it.

I don't want to tell it life it is

but to be it

like you want it.

I don't want

to tell others how to do it

but to do it

to have to be always right but

to admit it when I'm wrong.

I don't want to be a census taker

but an obstetrician

not an involved person, a professional

but a friend

I don't want to be insensitive

but to hurt where other people hurt

nor to say, "I know how you feel."

but to say, "God knows."

and I'll try

if you'll be patient with me

and meanwhile I'll be quiet.

I don't want to scorn the cliches of others

but to mean everything I say

including this.

10. People often tend to take pride in the religious duty that they perform. There are very few things that quench the power of God at work in the midst of his people like pride. It is insidious in it’s advance and by the time it is diagnosed, the damage has been done.

Any discipline propagated by the one who has mastered it tends to place it out of reach for the one who wants to personally implement it.

Resources for Future Messages

So far today, Lord, I've done all right. I haven't gossiped; I haven't lost my temper; I haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish, or overindulgent. I'm very thankful for that. But in a few moments, Lord, I'm going to get out of bed. And from then on, I'm going to need a lot of help."

Workplace Prayer

Lord Jesus, as I enter this workplace I bring your presence with me, I speak Your peace, Your grace, and Your perfect order into the atmosphere of this office.

I acknowledge Your Lordship over all that will be spoken, thought, decided, and accomplished within these walls.

Lord Jesus, I thank You for the gifts You have deposited in me. I do not take them lightly, but commit to using them responsibly and well.

Give me a fresh supply of truth and beauty; on which to draw as I do my job.

Anoint my creativity, my ideas, my energy so that even my smallest task may bring you honor.

Lord, when I'm confused, guide me, when I'm weary, energize me.

Lord, when I'm burned out, infuse me with the light of Your Holy Spirit.

May the work I do and the way I do it, bring hope, life, and courage to all that I come in contact with today.

And Oh Lord, even in this day's most stressful moments, may I rest in You.

In the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, I pray.

Amen

God Is At Work!

By Bill Denton

“. . . The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much” (Jas. 5:16)

A real answer to prayer will usually let us in for more than we ask for. A man prays for strength, for instance, without much thought of the matter, as though strength could be wrapped up in a package like a pound of tea and handed to one. Strength must be grown; it comes from struggle against obstacles. The only way in which a prayer for strength can be answered is by putting a man into a place where he will have to struggle. . . Many people make that prayer thoughtlessly without realizing that if they really had the spirit of Jesus, it would knock themselves and their whole world upside down. Halford E. Luccock (1885-1960)

At some point in my life, it dawned on me that a great many of my prayers, which I thought to have been either ignored or unanswered by God, were actually in the very process of being granted to me. It appeared that they were ignored or unanswered because I could not see that my “prayer-package” had arrived. In other words, I was expecting for God to wave a magic wand and, presto, whatever I prayed about should have happened, just the way I prayed about it.

Perhaps this is why so many people do not pray. Their view of prayer is that it is some kind of cosmic slot machine. Hit the jackpot and win big! Otherwise, it’s just a bunch of handle-pulling and confusion about why others seem to be doing so well and we struggle.

We do not think enough about how God answers prayer. Might God simply grant the direct answer to a prayer? Sure. That said, however, the truth of the matter is that for many, many things for which we pray, God’s answers are wrapped up in a whole different dressing.

I’ve jokingly said to people, “Be careful when you pray for patience.” Why? Because God will likely grant you the answer to that prayer, not at the snap of his fingers, but by allowing, even bringing into your life, that which otherwise would make you impatient. The difference is that your intent is to be patient, God’s intent is that you be patient, and the circumstances and situations he works into your life are designed to help you become patient. In the middle of all that, we might wonder what happened to patience! The same things that create impatience in one person are the tools of patience in another.

Apply that elsewhere. Ever pray to be a faithful Christian? Faithful Christians stand against all sorts of pressures, persecutions and problems. Ever pray for strength to resist temptation? If so, you’ll recognize the fact that such strength isn’t needed except in the face of temptation.

Prayer is so powerful it can change your life. But, those changes are not some magical witches brew of hocus-pocus! No, prayer is wonderfully real life. Listen to your prayers and then watch what God brings into your life.

You just might be looking right at the answer to your prayers. Such a view will eliminate the exasperated, scared-to-death approach to living. God is at work. Cooperate.

Pray with your intelligence. Bring things to God that you have thought out and think them out again with Him. That is the secret of good judgment. Repeatedly place your pet opinions and prejudices before God. He will surprise you by showing you that the best of them need refining and some the purification of destruction.

... Charles H. Brent (1862-1929), Adventures in Prayer

Mrs. Oswald Chambers once said of her husband, "Like all teachers of forceful personality, he constantly had people longing to pour out their intimate troubles to him. I remember at the close of one meeting a woman came up to him with the words, "Oh, Mr. Chambers, I feel I must tell you about myself.' As he led her away to a quiet corner, I resigned myself to a long wait; but he was back again in a few minutes. As we went home, I remarked on the speed with which he managed to free himself, and he replied, "I just asked her if she had ever told God all about herself. When she said she hadn't, I advised her to go home and pour out before Him as honestly as she could all her troubles, then see if she still needed or wanted to relate them to me.'" Chambers knew the importance of going directly to Jesus when faced with a special need or a trying situation.

See: James 1:5, Phil 4:6

What should we pray about? Take a look at an excerpt from the prayers of Samuel Logan Brengle, an evangelist of the Salvation Army at the beginning of our century:

"Keep me, O Lord, from waxing mentally and spiritually dull and stupid. Help me to keep the physical, mental, and spiritual fiber of the athlete, of the man who denies himself daily and takes up his cross and follows Thee. Give me good success in my work, but hide pride from me. Save me from the self-complacency that so frequently accompanies success and prosperity. Save me from the spirit of sloth, of self-indulgence, as physical infirmities and decay creep upon me."

See: Psa 61:1-2; Rom 12:12

The Morning Hour

The morning is the gate of the day, and it should be well guarded with prayer. It is one end of the thread on which the day's actions are strung, and should be well knotted with devotion. If we felt the majesty of life we should be more careful of its mornings. He who rushes from his bed to his business and waiteth not to worship is as foolish as though he had not put on his clothes, or cleansed his face, and as unwise as though he had dashed into battle without arms or armor. Be it ours to bathe in the softly flowing river of communion with God, before the heat of the wilderness and the burden of the way begins to oppress.

-- Charles Spurgeon

See: Psa 5:3; Psa 119:147; Mark 1:35

Have you ever wondered why a pigeon walks so funny? According to an interesting article in the Detroit Free Press, a pigeon walks the way it does so it can see where it's going. Because it can't adjust its focus as it moves, the pigeon actually has to bring its head to a complete stop between steps in order to refocus. This is the way it walks: head forward, stop; head back, stop. Don't laugh -- that's how it goes!

In our spiritual walk with the Lord we have the same problem as the pigeon. We have a hard time seeing while we're moving. We also need to stop between steps -- to refocus on where we are in relation to the World and the will of God. That's not to say we have to stop and pray and meditate about every little decision in life. But certainly our walk with the Lord needs to have built into it a pattern of "stops," which enable us to see more clearly before moving on.

See: Judg 18:5; 1 Sam 14:36; Psa 46:10

"The one concern of the devil is to keep Christians from praying. He fears nothing from prayerless studies, prayerless work and prayerless religion. He laughs at our toil, mocks at our wisdom, but he trembles when we pray." (Samuel Chadwick)

"I would rather teach one man to pray than 10 men to preach." (Charles Spurgeon)

"The man who mobilizes the Christian church to pray will make the greatest contribution to world evangelization in history." (Andrew Murray)

See: 1 Tim 2:8

Prayer is no petty duty, put into a corner; no piecemeal performance made out of the fragments of time which have been snatched from business and other engagements of life; but it means that the best of our time, the heart of our time and strength must be given.

Prayer that affects one's ministry must give tone to one's life. The praying which gives color and bent to character is no pleasant hurried pastime. Praying is spiritual work; and human nature does not like taxing, spiritual work. Human nature wants to sail to heaven under a favoring breeze, a full, smooth sea. Prayer is humbling work!!!

So we come to one of the crying evils of these times, maybe of all times -- little or no praying. Of these two evils, perhaps little praying is worse than no praying. Little praying is a kind of make- believe, a salve for the conscience, a farce and a delusion.

The little estimate we put on prayer is evidence from the little time we give to it.

It is necessary to iterate and reiterate that prayer, as a mere habit, as a performance gone through by routine or in a professional way, is a dead and rotten thing.

Prayer is not a little habit pinned onto us while we were tied to our mother's apron strings: neither is it a little decent quarter of a minute's grace said over an hour's dinner, but it is a more serious work of our most serious years.

No leaving can make up for the failure to pray. No earnestness, no diligence, no study, no gifts will supply its lack.

-- Power Through Prayer, by E.M. Bounds (1835-1913)

See: Eph 6:18-20

A Parent's Prayer

"Lord, you know my inadequacies. You know my weaknesses, not only in parenting, but in every area of my life. As you broke the fishes and the loaves to feed the five thousand, now take my meager effort and use it to bless my family.

"Make up for the things I did wrong. Satisfy the needs that I have not satisfied. Wrap your great arms around my children and draw them close to you. And be there when they stand at the great crossroads between right and wrong. All I can give is my best, and I've done that before. Therefore, I submit to you my children and myself and the job I have done as a parent. The outcome belongs to you."

-- Straight Talk to Men and Their Wives, Dr. James Dobson

Build Me a Son, Lord

Please read General Douglas MacArthur's prayer for his son.

Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak, and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid; one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory.

Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be; a son who will know Thee and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge.

Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storm; here let him learn compassion for those who fail.

Build me a son whose heart will be clean, whose goal will be high; a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men; one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past.

And after all these things are his, add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor, so that he may always be serious, yet never take himself too seriously. Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.

Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, "I have not lived in vain."