Prayers for the People: #1

That I would love God more and myself less

I don't know about you, but this screams John 3:30 right after John the Baptist says he is not the Christ but, "He (meaning Jesus) must become greater; I must become less." Shouldn't that really be our goal as followers, to become less? I love God quite a bit. But I don't know that I can say that I love Him more than myself. I am usually putting what I want in front of what He wants. In the end that usually puts me in a bad spot, and He always comes through for me somehow, and then the cycle starts all over again.

Brother Lawrence has a lot to say about loving God more than yourself. I mean, the guy embodied the idea of constantly living in the presence of God. As a cook he prayed this:

"Lord of all posts and pans and things . . .
Make me a saint by getting meals
And washing up the plates!"

This guy was serious about living his life for God and with God. There are over 13 places in his book (so he didn't write all of it, most was written by people after they talked to him, or worked with him) where he talks about the love he has for God and how that makes everything else in life pale in comparison. I am just going to pick a few:

• He (Brother Lawrence) had always been governed by love, without selfish views; and that having resolved to make the love of God the end of all his actions, he had found reasons to be well satisfied with his method.
• Our only business was to love and delight ourselves in God.
• I renounced, for the love of Him, everything that was not He, and I began to live as if there was none but He and I in the world.
• Believe me, count as lost each day you have not used in loving God.

He was pretty serious about his love of God. How often do I look at loving God as the goal, or the end, of my actions and day? Here we go with the cycle again.