The night has passed, and the day lies open before us;
Let us pray with one heart and mind.

Silence is kept

As we rejoice in the gift of this new day, so may the light of your presence, O God, set our hearts on fire with love for you; now and for ever. Amen.

Good Morning My Dear Friends, and welcome to another glorious day.
The words above are found at the beginning of our Daily Morning Prayer, and they set us up but immediately putting a whole range of things in to a beautiful perspective. Our Morning Prayer stems from the monastic tradition of Lauds where we wake up and give praise (laudate) to God. So in our simple version we begin by acknowledging where we are, and what we can do.
The night has passed – we have got through the darkness – and now we embrace the light, and the new day is full of opportunity. A new dawn, a new start, a new beginning, and the first thing we are called to do is join together with people of faith with one heart and mind. Even though we may well be using this prayer on our own, the words are ‘Let US pray’.
We are reminded that together we are the Body of Christ, and we do this living in union with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Let us pray with one heart and mind. 
We start the day praying that we are at one with our neighbours and fellow pilgrims. This is such a strong wake up call for any community that is divided, or any fellowship that is fractured. We are reminded that it is not our personal will that is important, but our discerning and practice of the will of God.

Divisions within churches, families, groups, communities and nations have been around for ever, and sometimes they are accepted as the way of the world. But they are not the way of faith, and the message of Jesus is very clearly one of love and peace, unity and reconciliation. So it is good to note that each day we are not condemned for our divisions, but rather given a new opportunity to come together in heart and mind, and we do this by the use of silence. We just be still in the presence of God.

We are then reminded that our first thoughts are those of rejoicing. Sometimes it is so easy to forget this. We wake with aches and pains, and for some of us it takes a while to get things moving. Then before long the great issues of the world can come and crowd our minds. But the monks had the great idea of starting with God before anything else, and it really works. The new day is a gift, to be received with thanksgiving and joy, and not to be taken for granted. In my experience if we begin with God, rather than the news, then we can find things to be joyful about. If we begin with the news, then our hearts can look for things to fill us with despair. (The monks spend their mid day prayers focussing on the needs of the world)

Once we have given thanks for the new day, we do two beautiful things simultaneously. We recognise that we are in the light and presence of God, and then we make our first request.

The Light of Christ reminds us of that Great Easter Proclamation. Every day is a resurrection day! A day of praise in which we give thanks that we are in the presence of God, and this prayer creates the opportunity to reflect on that.
Sometimes we take that presence for granted. Sometimes it feels as if we are on our own. Sometimes life is a struggle. But always God is with us. We have got through the darkness. All shall be well.
And then our request. But this is not just a polite suggestion, but a heartfelt desire that God will set our hearts on fire with love for you. If we pray that, the surely God will grant it.
‘Our hearts on fire’ leads us immediately to think of the Holy Spirit, guiding, cleansing and inspiring us to love God. If we live as though that is true, we will discover that it is.

This simple, but beautiful prayer sets us up for the day, and I commend it to you.

If you would like to follow the pattern of morning and or evening prayer, there are plenty of options from books Common Worship, Daily Prayer to a simple free phone app ‘Daily Prayer’ both from Church House Publishing.

All of the clergy in the team would be happy to chat with you about your prayer life if you would like that.

In the meantime, please pray for us, as we do you.

Bless you, Bless you, Bless you.

Fr Marcus