Seedsower Music:: Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep

One never knows what a day might hold. So to safely get through a day is a mercy of God, and He deserves our thanks. John Baillie gives us a helpful example from his prayer life.

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Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep

November 3, 2008

It is good....to proclaim your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night. Psalm 92:2

First published in 1937, John Baillie's A DIARY OF PRIVATE PRAYER has become a devotional classic, in the vein of Lancelot Andrewes. Here is a particular prayer prayed as he ended his day.

"Now unto Thee, O heavenly Father, be all praise and glory that day by day Thou dost richly fill my life with various blessings:

A home to share, kindred to love, and friends to cherish:

A place to fill and a work to do:

A green world to live in, blue skies above me, and pure air to breathe:

(if you're now wondering where he lived that awakened this particular praise - obviously not Southern California - he was professor of divinity at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland - a very green place with really nice air!)

Healthy exercise and simple pleasures:

My race's long history to remember and its great men to follow:

Good books to read and many arts and crafts to delight in:

So much that is worth knowing and the skill and science to know it:

Those high thoughts that sometimes fill my mind and come I know not whence:

Many happy days, and that inward calm that Thou givest me in days of gloom:

The peace, passing understanding, that comes from Thine indwelling in my soul:

The faith that looks through death and the hope of larger life beyond the grave.

I thank Thee, O Lord God, that though with liberal hand Thou hast at all times showered Thy blessings upon our human kind, yet in Jesus Christ Thou hast done greater things for us than Thou ever didst before:

Making home sweeter and friends dearer:

Turning sorrow into gladness and pain into the soul's victory:

Robbing death of its sting:

Robbing sin of its power:

Renewing history:

Making peace more peaceful and joy more joyful and faith and hope more secure. Amen."

Goodnight. Zzzzzzz.......