Merton Prayer

This prayer by Thomas Merton helps me put my confidence and hope in the right place—not in knowing what lies ahead, but Who leads me. We don’t know as much as we think and we can’t know what we often demand to know. But we can still have “the peace that surpasses understanding.”

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.

And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.

And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it.

Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

“from Thoughts in Solitude Copyright © 1956, 1958