Today while June has driven down to Macon to see about a recall regarding her Lexus (which she inherited from her brother Harold several years ago) from the Toyota corporation regarding something to do with an oil hose, I’m staying at home, having decided to do a bit of pre-spring house cleaning: scrubbing the bathroom floors, cleaning spots out of the carpets with a pan of vinegar-water, pouring some Drano into a drain that should be taught to work better, washing a load or two of clothes, vacuuming the house, and straightening up my study. All of this, quite frankly, in preparation for my stay-at-home next week while June goes on a cruise and her daughter and friends. As you might imagine, I like a clean house, everything in its place, and a place for everything–as the cliche goes.
It’s on days like this that I like to remember Brother Lawrence who wrote The Practice of the Presence of God. Brother Lawrence is famous for his recommendations to be constant in prayer even while doing chores around the kitchen. As a seventeenth-century French monk, Brother Lawrence developed a way of praying with awareness which some say is closely allied to the kind of attention practiced of by our brothers and sisters who train themselves in mindfulness meditation. For example, in The Practice of the Presence of God, he wrote: “Lift up your heart to Him, sometimes even at your meals, and when you are in company; the least little remembrance will always be acceptable to Him. You need not cry very loud; he is nearer to us than we are aware of.” Brother Lawrence was intensely aware that he was in constant need of grace, and much of praying was given to frequent repentance. So with me. Today I find myself far less devoted to God, my wife, friends and family that I wish. Like Brother Lawrence I too am in need of grace, repentance, and forgiveness. May God have mercy on me, and may He empty Himself into me even as I empty myself so I can be filled with His Spirit. Renew my intensions, O Lord, so that this day I live with all my heart, soul, and mind given to You. May God help me to love others, especially those whom I find irritating and irksome, while I take out the trash, get some laundry done, blow more pine needles off the deck, and drive the truck to the Monticello landfill where I take two old, wornout tires that need to be recycled.
