Morning Prayer from Isaiah 6

O Lord Adonai, You alone sit exalted in ineffable majesty. When you are silent, I tremble, for your power is overwhelming. You, Creator and Judge, harden the hearts of men. You alone are truly sovereign and thrice holy. You live in utter distinction from all those whom you have created. Your eyes are too pure to behold iniquity and in no wise pardon the guilty. My soul, O my Creator, is in the palm of your hand. In your unspeakable exaltation, in the brilliance of your purity and in the heat of your raging fire I cover my face and fly to your beloved Son in whom you are well pleased and whose blood speaks kindly for me. I praise Thy name, Lord, Adonai. O holy and sovereign master, you alone are glorious.

King Witlaf and New Years Eve

For many the merry memento of Christmas is nullified quickly by the renewed new year subscription that occurs each January 1. Yes, time to make merry and forget all that background music about "second birth" and "peace on earth good will to man." Time's a wastin'...the ball's a droppin'...on to a new year. For me, however, I leave new year revelry to King Witlaf's men. When Christ saved me, my passion for alcohol passed away with my new passion for Jesus Christ, His kingdom and His righteousness.

Witlaf, a king of the Saxons, Ere yet his last he breathed, To the merry monks of Croyland His drinking horn bequeathed, that, whenever they sat at their revels, And drank from the golden bowl, They might remember the donor, And breathe a prayer for his soul.

So sat they once at Christmas, And bade the goblet pass; In their beards the red wine glistened like dew-drops in the grass. They drank to the soul of Witlaf, they drank to Christ the Lord, and to each of the Twelve Apostles, who had preached his holy word.

They drank to the Saints and Martyrs of the dismal days of yore, and as soon as the horn was empty they remembered one Saint more. And the reader droned from the pulpit like the murmur of many bees, the legend of good Saint Guthlac, And Saint Basil's homilies; till the great bells of the convent, from their prison in the tower, Guthlac and Bartholomaeus, proclaimed the midnight hour.

And the Yule-log cracked in the chimney, and the Abbot bowed his head, and the flamelets flapped and flickered, but the Abbot was stark and dead. Yet still in his pallid fingers he clutched the golden bowl, in which, like a pearl dissolving, had sunk and dissolved his soul. But not for this their revels the jovial monks forbore, for they cried, "Fill high the goblet! We must drink to one Saint more!"

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow