Robert Hawker: Piercing Heaven – Puritan’s Prayers

Jesus, Master, have mercy upon me! I wake this morning poor, wretched, empty, and needy—as though I never before had heard of your dear name, or had never been living upon your fullness.

But you know I cannot live upon the alms of yesterday, no more than my body can stay healthy from the food I ate many days in the past. Without a new supply, Lord, I know that I am yours, and that you are mine.

So I come to you for a new supply, and surely you will not send me away empty.

Lord, I rejoice even that I feel my poverty—that way, as an empty vessel, I am better suited to receive your fullness.

Give in, blessed Jesus, to my poor hungry soul. Then I will find a reason to rejoice that my emptiness and begging pushed me to seek you, and that my need gave you an opportunity to display your grace.

Yes, blessed Lord, I am not only content to be poor and to be needy, but to be nothing, to be worse than nothing. As long as you receive glory by showing your love and giving out of your riches, I will glory even in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

A beggar still I wish to be, and to lay at your gate, if only to glimpse your face, and to receive one token from your fair hand. Then am I most full, when most empty, to be filled with Jesus.

Amen.