A Liturgy for: The Afternoon Slump

Strength for the Weary

Liturgies for the Little Years: In this series, you’ll find words for the everyday experiences of raising young kids in prayer form. My hope is that these liturgies would bring a sense of sacredness, meaning and worship to the ordinary moments of daily life as a parent.

For a little background music or later listening, this song pairs perfectly with today’s reading!

Brought Low

In our house, morning mom and afternoon mom are too very different people. In the morning, my energy-tank is full, and my rosy-eyed resolutions for the day carry me forward with cheer, whimsey and patience. By the afternoon, on the other hand, my nerves often feel like they’ve had an unfortunate accident with an electrically charged outlet and my heart is often heavy with disappointment. Why am I snapping so quickly at my kids? Why is our house such a wreck? Why can’t my kids get along?

One thing I’ve noticed spiritually speaking between the morning and afternoon is that I’m more likely to seek out God in the morning hours. When I’m feeling good about myself and my circumstances, I more confidently talk to God in prayer and more readily dwell on his person and presence. However, when I’m feeling a sense of shame with myself or discontentment with my circumstances, I find myself holding back from talking to God. I can feel I’m not in a good enough place to come before him. I can feel that my less-than-ideal circumstances don’t fit within the framework of my faith.

In short, the afternoon can often bring me to a very low place. Can you relate?

A Biblical Account of Lowliness

Recently, I’ve been convicted about my propensity to approach God when I’m feeling good about myself and shy away from him when I’m not. It’s interesting that many of us tend to do this, because Jesus actually encourages the opposite. Look with me at a teaching of Jesus in Luke 18.

Luke 18:9-14

9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

In Jesus’s parable, the person that found commendation with God was not the one who felt good about themselves and their life but rather, the one deeply humbled… the one who would not even lift their eyes to heaven but could simply pray, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

Honestly, these sound about like the only words of prayer I might possibly be able to utter by the afternoon.

“God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

And how freeing is it that these words, this humbled state, is actually something our Lord delights in!

A Humble Heart

I wrote this liturgy for the mom who also tends to struggle with the state of herself and her circumstances as the day wanes on. If this is you, I hope you are encouraged by the reminder that God does not desire perfection from you. He is not after your performance. What’s most beautiful to God is a heart that reaches out to him in humble dependence. Our God is a God of grace, delighting to give mercy to his children.

A Liturgy for: The Afternoon Slump

O God, when this morning’s fresh aspirations
have been long left behind;
when the sunburst of my energy
has waned, barely bright;
when all my patience and my joy
have collapsed into a sigh,
let me not yet
cast this day aside. 

When all I can offer
is my weakness for your strength;
when all I can contribute
is a soul that pants for grace; 
when “Father, help me now”
is all that I can pray,
“‘All’?” I hear you say,
“My child, lift your face! 
that’s all
I’ve ever wanted.”

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