![[Daily Devotionals/Down/Devotion Day Five.jpg]] > Come to Stillness: Take a few minutes to allow your mind and heart to be still before God.![[Down_Day_Five.mp3]] ### Opening Prayer: *Lord, how great is our dilemma! In Thy Presence silence best becomes us, but love inflames our hearts and constrains us to speak. Were we to hold our peace the stones would cry out; yet if we speak, what shall we say? Teach us to know that we cannot know, for the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Let faith support us where reason fails, and we shall think because we believe, not in order that we may believe. In Jesus’ name. Amen. (Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer)* #### Psalm for the Week: Psalm 138 #### Give Thanks to the Lord Of David. *138 I give you thanks, O Lord, with my whole heart; before the gods I sing your praise;2 I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.[a]3 On the day I called, you answered me; my strength of soul you increased.[b]* *4 All the kings of the earth shall give you thanks, O Lord, for they have heard the words of your mouth, 5 and they shall sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord. 6 For though the Lord is high, he regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar.* *7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life; you stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand delivers me. 8 The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.* #### Scripture for the Day: Mark 10:35-45 #### The Request of James and John *35 And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” 36 And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?” 37 And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” 38 Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” 39 And they said to him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized, 40 but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” 41 And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John. 42 And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 43 But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,[a] 44 and whoever would be first among you must be slave[b] of all. 45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”* #### Reading for Reflection: *Years ago, someone told me that humility is central to the spiritual life. That made sense to me: I was proud to think of myself as humble! But this person did not tell me that the path to humility, for some of us at least, goes through humiliation, where we are brought low, rendered powerless, stripped of pretenses and defenses, and left feeling fraudulent, empty, and useless—a humiliation that allows us to regrow our lives from the ground up, from the humus of common ground.* ​ *The spiritual journey is full of paradoxes. One of them is that the humiliation that brings us down—down to ground on which it is safe to stand and to fall—eventually takes us to a firmer and fuller sense of self. When people ask me how it felt to emerge from depression, I can give only one answer: I felt at home in my own skin, and at home on the face of the earth, for the first time. (Let Your Life Speak by Parker J. Palmer)* #### Reflection and Listening: silent and written #### Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself #### Song for the Week: How Great is Our God *The splendor of the King clothed in majesty* *Let all the earth rejoice, All the earth rejoice* *He wraps himself in Light and darkness tries to hide* *And trembles at His voice, trembles at His voice* *How great is our God, sing with me* *How great is our God and all will see* *How great, how great is our God* *Age to age He stands and time is in His hands* *Beginning and the end, beginning and the end* *The Godhead three in One, Father, Spirit, Son* *The Lion and the Lamb, the Lion and the Lamb* *How great is our God, sing with me* *How great is our God and all will see* *How great, how great is our God* *Name above all names* *Worthy of all praise* *My heart will sing* *How great is our God* ### Closing Prayer: *Lord Jesus, give us the grace and the strength and the courage to follow your invitation downward—to the place where there is only you and nothing else. In your name and for your sake we pray. Amen. (JLB)* --- [[Down Day 2]] [[Down Day 1]] [[Down Day 3]] [[Down Day 4]] [[Down Day 5]] [[Down Day 6]] [[Down Day 7]] #Down