The Serenity Prayer

Donna Lowrance

     The Serenity Prayer is a prayer I have prayed throughout my life.  I can remember reading the prayer when I was first learning to read, and it somehow branded into my  memory from that moment. 

     There have been events in my life I had no control over that made me feel guilty or angry, but when I read that first line, I am comforted. 

     As I read and focus on praying to God, I am often granted the wisdom and understanding that these things helped to shape the person God is molding me to be. 

     Courage was never my strong point.  Some of my biggest regrets in life were due to lack of courage.  It is a trait I pray for often and find myself visualizing a Christian soldier.  In a sense, this prayer is my armor. 

     I researched who wrote this prayer and found this version written by Reinhold Niebuhr (1892–1971) during the Great Depression and WWII.  This complete version says it all for me:

God, give me grace to accept with serenity
 

the things that cannot be changed,

Courage to change the things

which should be changed,

and the Wisdom to distinguish

the one from the other.

Living one day at a time,

Enjoying one moment at a time,

Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,

Taking, as Jesus did,

This sinful world as it is,

Not as I would have it,

Trusting that You will make all things right,

If I surrender to Your will,

So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,

And supremely happy with You forever in the next.

Amen.

 

My Salvation Experience

John Bullock

I was eight years old when I first felt the tug of God's spirit on my life. My parents had faithfully taught me about God's love. I had heard the pastor's call for people to come to God. I had heard all these things. But it had not yet become personal FOR ME!

But that Sunday night in our little church, for the first time, I knew God was speaking to me. He was saying to me that I needed to open my heart to Him. That's when I just moved to the aisle and went forward to tell my pastor, "I want to be saved."

Years later, I told my mother that I had responded to God's call the first time I realized it was for me. She smiled and said, "So my prayer was answered. I always prayed that my children would accept the Savior just as soon as they became aware of their need."