July 2007 - Volume 11, Issue 12

Lord, Slow Me Down

by Wilfred Peterson

Photo of a landscape with a blue sky, green grass and a single lush treeSlow me down, Lord!
Ease the pounding of my heart
By quieting of my mind.
Steady my harried pace
With a vision of the eternal reach of time.

Give me,
Amidst the confusions of my day,
The calmness of the everlasting hills.
Break the tensions of my nerves
With the soothing music of the sighing streams
That live in my memory.
Help me to know
The magical restoring power of sleep.

Teach me the art
Of taking minute vacations of slowing down to look at a flower;
To chat with an old friend or to make a new one;
To pat a stray dog;
To watch a spider build a web;
To smile at a child;
Or to read a few lines from a good book.

Photo of a single lush treeRemind me each day
That the race is not always the swift;
That there is more life than increasing its speed.
Let me look upward
Into the branches of the towering oak
And know that it grew slowly and well.

Slow me down, Lord,
And inspire me to send my roots deep
Into the soil of life's enduring values
That I may grow toward the stars
Of my greater destiny.

- Wilfred Peterson