Seeking the Counsel of the Living God
Asks for present guidance through conscience, nature, human mercy, and inward light while respecting the wisdom of earlier generations.
Historical edition. Historical claims and instructions are preserved as historical context.
ALMIGHTY GOD, we confess that we need a guidance better than our own, a hand stronger than ours, a counsel deeper than our wisdom, and an aim higher than earth. Because we know so little, and our wisdom is not deep, and our hand doth shake too oft with sin and passion, we cry unto Thee, “Lead us by Thy right hand, O God! guide us by Thy counsel, and afterwards receive us unto glory.” We beseech Thee, make us wise to know the counsel of God, where it is, what it is, and how it is to be gotten; and let us seek it in no false places, nor expect to hear it in foolish ways. Lord God! when we seek Thy counsel, let it be of the LIVING GOD. Our fathers sought Thee, and in some things they found Thee, but in some things Thou wast hidden. Grant unto us, not their vision, but their desire for it; not their counsel, but the wisdom which led them to seek it; not their words, but their spirit. We pray Thee more for the Spirit than for the Word of God; we pray Thee more for the light that lighteth inwardly than for the light that is seen. Whatsoever others may do, we need the counsel of the LIVING GOD; for God looketh through all glorious things of life, His movements are through all things, by His breath is the heaving of the sea, His touch gives life, His touch withdrawn brings death.
O God! we would seek Thee in all fair things, in the eyes of the little babe, in the sweetness of the flower, in the cheerful voice of the bird, and in the solemn wail of the storm. Thou art the LIVING GOD! We seek Thee, O God! in the heart of man; in his mercy, and his pitifulness, his lovingkindness, and patience. We seek Thee in the ways of life; we will not hear what men of old have found the way of life to be, but rather what we find it to be as living with the Living God. And grant us that whilst we greatly reverence the words of the wise, nevertheless we may not surrender at any time the light that lighteth us inwardly. Lord God! give us evermore this light, guide us by Thy counsel, and afterwards receive us unto glory.—AMEN.