I am a planner. I am good at creating plans and processes to make things happen effectively and efficiently. Planning is one of my happy places.
While this skill is often helpful, it can also work to my detriment. I become so attached to my plans that I am slow to relinquish them when they are not working. I try to bludgeon my way forward even when it’s clear that the path is blocked.
I get so caught in my plans that I forget that God always has a better plan, if I’ll just let go of my own way. Isaiah 55:8-9 tells us “My plans aren’t your plans, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD. Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my plans than your plans.”
If that wasn’t enough of a reminder to let go of my ways and trust in God’s plan, Jeremiah 29:11 reminds that God’s plans always have my best interest in mind (even when I can’t see it): “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
This set of prayers for use with an Anglican rosary are designed a reminder that our God is one who is capable of making a way out of no way and who has plans for us that are beyond our imagining, if we will only trust in those plans and follow the way God sets before us.
| Cross: | In all things You work for the good of those who love You, who have been called according to Your purpose. (Romans 8:28) May I always trust in Your plans and ways. |
| Invitatory bead: | Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are Your ways higher than my ways, and Your plans higher than my plans. I surrender my will and my plans to You in trust and love. |
| Cruciform beads: | Help me trust in You, Lord, with all my heart, and lean not on my own understanding. Help me acknowledge You in all my ways, and allow You to make straight my paths. (Proverbs 3:5-6) |
| Week bead 1: | You divide the waters and turn the sea into dry land to make path for Your people. (Exodus 14:21) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 2: | You make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 3: | You make streams come out of the rock and caused waters to flow down like rivers. (Psalm 78:16) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 4: | You life up every valley, and make low every mountain and hill; You make the uneven ground level, and the rough places a plain. (Isaiah 40:4) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 5: | You make the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers clean, and the deaf hear. (Matthew 11:5) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 6: | You raised the dead to life again. (Matthew 11:5) Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Week bead 7: | You make a way a way out of no way for Your people again and again. Help me to trust in You and Your plans with all my heart. |
| Invitatory bead: | Blessed is the One who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. They are like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit. (Jeremiah 17:7-8) |
| Cross: | In the name of the One whose ways are higher than my ways and who is able to create a way out of no way before me, I ask for a deepened trust in You and Your plans for my life. All blessing and honor and glory and power be Yours forever. Amen. |
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