Father, when conversations take place, help me to truly listen.
Am I listening to understand, or am I listening to respond? When I am the subject of a disagreement or controversy, am I genuinely trying to understand another person’s perspective, or am I searching for flaws in their argument to defend myself? Am I approaching the conversation with a willingness to learn, or with a need to teach? Am I seeking understanding, or am I simply seeking to be right?
Father, help me recognize the difference.
I often say that we can all find ourselves in hell with good intentions. Too often, we excuse our behavior by saying, “That’s not what I meant,” or “My intention was never to hurt anyone.” And perhaps that is true. But the impact of our actions does not always reflect the purity of our intentions.
I want my intentions to come from a place of love rather than ego, from a desire to serve rather than a need to be seen, and from a willingness to understand rather than a desire to be understood. But Father, I know that good intentions alone are not enough. My behavior, my reactions, and my actions must reflect the intentions I claim to have.
The best apology is changed behavior.
Help me live in a way that makes my apologies less necessary, not because I have become incapable of making mistakes, but because I have become more willing to recognize them, take responsibility for them, and change.
Father, when someone says something about me that I do not like, when someone challenges my character, questions my intentions, or disagrees with my perspective, help me listen not only with my ears but also with my heart.
Give me the ears to hear and the eyes to see what I might otherwise refuse to acknowledge. Remind me that discomfort does not necessarily mean something is wrong. Sometimes, the things that make me most uncomfortable are the very things I need to examine most closely.
Give me the discernment to separate what is unfounded from what is true. Help me recognize the difference between another person’s misunderstanding of me and the parts of their criticism that reveal something I have been unwilling or unable to see in myself.
Do not allow my ego to dismiss a truth simply because I do not like what the person in front of me is saying.
Give me the courage to be honest with myself, even when that honesty exposes something I would rather hide. And give me the humility to do something with what I discover. Let my self-examination lead to transformation rather than shame, and let my awareness become action rather than another lesson I claim to understand but fail to practice.
Father, I know that we can influence others in ways we never intended. We can believe we are doing what is right while unknowingly causing harm. We can speak in the name of truth while allowing our pride to distort it. We can believe we are helping someone while our behavior pushes them further away from the very things we hope they will find.
Help me align my behavior with Your will so that I do not become an obstacle in another person’s journey because I have allowed my ego to take the lead.
Let me never become so concerned with correcting someone else’s path that I neglect to examine my own.
I also recognize that sometimes another person’s discomfort with me may have more to do with what is happening within them than with anything I have done. Perhaps my words challenge something they believe. Perhaps my actions stir a conscience they would rather silence. Perhaps their disagreement is not an indication that I have done something wrong.
Give me the wisdom to discern these things without using them as an excuse to avoid accountability.
Help me remember that I am not responsible for controlling how everyone perceives me, but I am responsible for examining how I treat them. I cannot determine whether another person is walking in Your will, but I can continually ask whether I am walking in it myself.
Father, let my concern be less about whether others are missing the mark and more about whether I am allowing my ego to lead me away from You.
Help me be humble enough to question myself, honest enough to recognize my shortcomings, and courageous enough to change.
Help me reflect on my behavior before I criticize the behavior of another.
Help me focus on love in everything I do, not merely in what I intend, but in what I say, how I respond, and how I make others feel in my presence.
Help me listen better, especially when listening is difficult.
Help me be merciful rather than consumed with being right. Remind me that I can stand firmly in what I believe without standing in judgment of the person who believes differently.
Help me love more genuinely, without allowing my ego to disguise itself as righteousness.
Help me recognize when I am defending my pride rather than standing for truth, when I am trying to win an argument rather than understand a person, and when I am more interested in being seen as a good person than in actually becoming one.
Give me the courage to change when change is needed. Do not let my familiarity with Your teachings fool me into believing that I am living them. Do not let me confuse knowing the right thing with doing the right thing.
Father, I do not want to spend my life explaining my intentions while repeating the same behaviors. I do not want to become so skilled at recognizing the shortcomings of others that I become blind to my own.
I want my life to reflect what I say I believe.
When I fall short, help me acknowledge it without excuses. When I hurt someone, help me take responsibility without making their reaction the center of the conversation. When I am wrong, help me admit it. And when I discover something within myself that needs to change, help me find the strength to do the work.
Let my growth be evident not only in what I understand, but in how I live.
Let the people closest to me experience the difference. Let my wife, my children, my family, my friends, and even those who disagree with me encounter more patience, more understanding, more compassion, and more mercy because of the work You are doing within me.
Father, help me become part of the solution rather than part of the problem.
May I bring peace where there is conflict, understanding where there is misunderstanding, humility where there is pride, and love where there is judgment.
And when I am tempted to focus on what someone else needs to change, gently turn my attention inward. Remind me that the person I have the greatest responsibility to work on is the person I see in the mirror.
I cannot promise that I will always get it right. But I pray that I will become increasingly willing to recognize when I get it wrong, increasingly humble in the face of truth, and increasingly faithful in putting what I learn into practice.
Father, let my intentions and my actions become one.
Let the love I speak of become the love I demonstrate.
Let the wisdom I seek become the wisdom I live.
And let the person I am becoming be reflected in the way I treat the people You place in my path.
Help me be humble.
Help me be honest.
Help me listen.
Help me love.
Help me change.
Not merely so that I may become a better person in the eyes of others, but so that I may become more aligned with You.
Amen.
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