God,
If worry were a string,
I’d be tied up.
If worry were my food.
I’d always eat, and never be filled.
If worry were my companion;
I’d be haunted til the end of my days.
But instead worry is my prayer–
allowing me to shape in sighs
and words and silence
all the things that tense my neck and shoulders
and fidget my fingers
and make me lose my keys and phone (again).
And because worry becomes my prayer–
you take it like a gift,
and don’t let it tie me up, or become my food, or my companion.
Instead you tame it, and teach me to live with it, and remind me that it is just one piece of life.
And that there are other things like kittens and clouds
and children blowing bubbles.
And sunshine, and raindrops to cool the summer days.
And you teach me to cry tears of relief,
and to call a friend,
and to turn the worry into prayer,
as many times as I need to.
So here’s a worrisome prayer–wrap it up for me Jesus,
and spin it with the Holy Spirit, so it loosens up around my soul I pray.
And be with me while I pray it please, God.
So I might breathe a little easier, I pray.
Amen.
Feel free to use/adapt/share with credit to Pastor Katy Stenta
If you want to support my work, follow my blog or please give to my Go Fund Me for Creative Writing (year 2) Doctorate or become a supporter with perks on Ko-Fi
Like this:
Like Loading...
Related
Author: katyandtheword
Pastor Katy has enjoyed ministry at New Covenant since 2010, where the church has solidified its community focus. Prior to that she studied both Theology and Christian Formation at Princeton Theological Seminary. She also served as an Assistant Chaplain at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital and as the Christian Educational Coordinator at Bethany Presbyterian at Bloomfield, NJ.
She is an writer and is published in Enfleshed, Sermonsuite, Presbyterian's today and Outlook. She writes prayers, liturgy, poems and public theology and is pursuing her doctorate in ministry in Creative Write and Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
She enjoys working within and connecting to the community, is known to laugh a lot during service, and tells as many stories as possible. Pastor Katy loves reading Science Fiction and Fantasy, theater, arts and crafts, music, playing with children and sunshine, and continues to try to be as (w)holistically Christian as possible.
"Publisher after publisher turned down A Wrinkle in Time," L'Engle wrote, "because it deals overtly with the problem of evil, and it was too difficult for children, and was it a children's or an adult's book, anyhow?" The next year it won the prestigious John Newbery Medal.
Tolkien states in the foreword to The Lord of the Rings that he disliked allegories and that the story was not one.[66] Instead he preferred what he termed "applicability", the freedom of the reader to interpret the work in the light of his or her own life and times.
View all posts by katyandtheword
katyandtheword 
One of my favorites, Katie!