An Instrument of Your Peace: Preaching Francis of Assisi

July 04, 2011 by Daniel Harrell

Continued from Page 2

To praise the Lord is both a declaration of allegiance and defiance; it denotes a total reordering of reality, both outside and in. "What a person is before God," Francis wrote, "that he or she is and nothing more." Yet as Francis showed, nothing more can be something else.

"Lord, make me an instrument of your peace," Francis prayed. "Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in forgiving that we are forgiven; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen."

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About Daniel Harrell

Daniel M. Harrell is Senior Minister of The Colonial Church, Edina, MN and author of How To Be Perfect: One Church's Audacious Experiment in Living the Old Testament Book of Leviticus (FaithWords, 2011). Follow him via Twitter, Facebook, or at his blog and website.

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