A Puritan Prayer at Christmas

“O God, take me in spirit to the watchful shepherds, and enlarge my mind;
let me hear good tidings of great joy, and hearing, believe, rejoice, praise, adore,
my conscience bathed in an ocean of repose,
my eyes uplifted to a reconciled Father;

“. . .  let me with Simeon clasp the new-born child to my heart,
embrace him with undying faith, exulting that he is mine and I am his.
In him thou hast given me so much that heaven can give no more.”

NOTES:

• This prayer comes from The Valley of Vision. I highly recommend this collection of Puritan devotionals.
• The complete prayer, “The Gift of Gifts”, is on the Banner of Truth website.
• For more of my Christmas posts:
  • The  Names of Jesus
  • Faithful and Watchful for the Lord to Come – Lessons learned from Simeon and Anna
  • I have quite a few on my blog, The Sovereign. Click here to choose from all the posts, or go to these select posts:
    • Our Lives, Our Worship, and the Incarnation of Christ with practical applications to our lives
    • C. S. Lewis on the Conception of Christ
    • Notice the names of Christ in Hark! the Herald Angels Sing
    • Martin Luther composed From Heaven above to Earth I Come to teach his children on Christmas Eve.
    • The Origin of Nativities
• “The Annunciation to the Shepherds” by Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669), is in the public domain (free of copyright restrictions). You can copy, modify, and distribute this work without contacting the Smithsonian. For more information, visit the Smithsonian’s Terms of Use page.