Prayer time 8 July 2026
Trust
I shall not be overcome.
Download a PDF of the prayer script
Orientation
Welcome. It's good to be here with you.
We are three weeks into Going Through — a four-week series of prayer with some of the oldest prayers of the Christian tradition. Week one was surrender: the withdrawal of our full attention from the fight against what is, and the giving of it wholly to God. Week two was endurance: showing up was the prayer. The staying and the praying were the same act.
Tonight is trust.
I want to say carefully what I mean by trust, because the word gets used to do damage. Trust is what Julian of Norwich is doing when she says all shall be well from her bedroom where she expects to die. That is what trust looks like.
And so tonight we pray from the seat of our soul. We pray from a place of wanting to remember, and from the soul that already knows how to trust and has understanding.
This July, in the Unity tradition, we are paying particular attention to the spiritual faculty of Understanding. Understanding is the spiritual capacity to see with the eyes of God, to perceive what is real beneath what is merely visible. Tonight we will find that trust and Understanding are the same movement.
The Psalmist knew this. When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. Psalm 56:3. A simple act. A turning. That is all we are doing tonight.
So, let us pray.
Relaxation
Original prayer: Brother Lawrence (Nicholas Herman of Lorraine), c.1614–1691. The Practice of the Presence of God, compiled posthumously 1692 from his letters and conversations.
We'll take a moment to relax our physical self, calm the mind and simply settle where we are.
Let the breath slow. Let the face soften. Let the shoulders drop. All the tensions and the troubles, and even the joys and thanksgivings of the day, we can lay them down now. Our body will be holding things: tensions created by our thoughts, our worries, our ruminations, our judgments on our world and on our day and on the people in our sphere. Breathing in and breathing out, we lay these things down, and as we do that, we can take our attention to the places in the body that are holding on.
Our first prayer tonight is from Brother Lawrence. We have used this prayer before, but tonight we use it in the place of relaxation. This prayer comes from his time as the cleaning-up fellow in the monastery kitchen. Prayer and communion with God in the ordinary. Here are his words, closely followed by a Unity rework.
THE ORIGINAL
The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clutter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the blessed sacrament.
THE UNITY REWORK — Affirmative Poetry
The presence I am looking for
is present in the kitchen.
In the noise. In the calling.
In the several persons wanting different things.
I do not have to leave this life to find God.
I have to find God in this life.
And having found God here,
I find God everywhere.
The time of business is the time of prayer.
The time of difficulty is the time of prayer.
The time of sitting with what I cannot fix
is the time of prayer.
I possess God in as great tranquility
as I will ever possess God anywhere.
Because God is here.
The centre of the sphere is here.
[Silence]
We find ourselves still and silent now. Psalm 46:10 — Be still and know that I am God. We are still, very still, and once we are still, the silence comes. Listen, dear ones, listen in our prayers.
Concentration
Original text: Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, 1961.
In concentration, we turn toward God.
Merton understood that the deepest self, what he called the true self, is already there. It is the self that God has always already known. To find it is to move inward, to where we have always already been.
Jesus said it plainly: On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. John 14:20. The finding is mutual. God in us, we in God, already.
THE ORIGINAL
There is only one problem on which all my existence, my peace, and my happiness depend: to discover myself in discovering God. If I find Him, I will find myself; and if I find my true self, I will find Him.
THE UNITY REWORK — I Am Statements
I am not separate from the God I am seeking.
The seeking and the finding are the same movement.
As I turn toward God, I turn toward the truth of what I am.
As I discover the truth of what I am, I discover God.
To find it is to move inward,
to where we have always already been.
I find myself in finding God.
I find God in finding myself.
They are not two things.
I rest in that truth now.
Meditation
Original prayer: Julian of Norwich, c.1342–c.1416. Revelations of Divine Love, c.1393. A different passage from the one used in Call 31.
The crux of our prayers tonight.
Julian was dying when she wrote this.
Isaiah had said it centuries before her: When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you. Isaiah 43:2. The waters come. The promise is presence inside them, not removal from them. Julian knew this. Hear her words.
THE ORIGINAL
He said not: Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shalt not be travailed, thou shalt not be afflicted. But He said: Thou shalt not be overcome.
I shall not be overcome.
He said these words full merrily and full mightily. And I understood this to be His meaning: that it is impossible that we should not be in the occasion of woe in one time or another; but His will is that we should not be overcome of it.
THE UNITY REWORK — Crux Affirmation
I shall not be overcome.
Not: I shall not be troubled.
Not: I shall not suffer.
Not: the circumstances will arrange themselves.
But: I shall not be overcome.
The love that made me does not change.
I am built for this.
I SHALL NOT BE OVERCOME.
Five minutes now. In the silence, let this hold you.
Realisation
Original text: St Bonaventure, 1221–1274. The Soul's Journey into God (Itinerarium Mentis in Deum), 1259, Prologue. Franciscan mystic and theologian.
Now we declare what is true.
Bonaventure wrote his great work of mystical theology in three days, on a mountain, in retreat. He was trying to see clearly. His prayer in the Prologue is for illumined sight, for the faculty that sees beneath the surface of things to what is actually there.
THE ORIGINAL
I call upon the first beginning, from whom all illuminations descend as from the Father of lights, from whom comes every good gift and every perfect gift — that he may enlighten the eyes of our mind to guide our feet into the way of that peace which surpasses all understanding.
trans. Ewert Cousins
[Silence]
Charles Fillmore taught that Understanding is one of the twelve spiritual faculties alive in every human soul. It is the capacity to see with the eyes of God, to perceive what is real beneath what is merely visible.
King Solomon wrote:
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5–6.
Solomon means: there is a faculty deeper than analysis. Acknowledge God and it opens.
The anxious mind is aware of the evidence and stops there. Understanding moves through it. Knowing rests in what is already true.
Fillmore associated this faculty with Thomas — the one who doubted, and then saw. The one whose understanding moved from intellectual demand for evidence to direct spiritual sight. My Lord and my God. Eight words. The whole journey of Understanding, completed in one breath.
The eyes of our understanding are being enlightened. We pray from inside that enlightening now.
I release the belief that trust requires me to understand how things will resolve.
I affirm: the Understanding I need is already given. The eyes of my mind are being enlightened, even now.
I release the thought that the evidence in front of me is the full story.
I affirm: beneath what is visible, God is at work. The roots are not finished.
I release the anxious mind's version of understanding, the one that relies only on the data.
I lean not on my own understanding. I lean on God, who is the source of all Understanding. I acknowledge God, and my paths are straight.
(Imagining the expansion of our understanding, happening even now.)
All illumination descends into me from the Father of lights.
Every good gift is already moving toward me.
Every perfect gift is already on its way.
The eyes of my Understanding are enlightened.
I see what I need to see, when I need to see it.
I see what I need to see, when I need to see it.
I see what I need to see, when I need to see it.
I do not require the full picture to take the next step.
The peace that passes understanding is beneath me, within me, around me, present where I am.
I stand in it.
I trust it.
I go forward from it.
Appreciation
Original prayer: Teresa of Avila, 1515–1582. ‘Nada te turbe,’ written c.1578, found inscribed in her breviary after her death. Spoken first in the Spanish in which she wrote it, then in English.
We are praying with Teresa again, as we did in week one. These are prayers worth repeating until they become our own. This really is a ferocious prayer, so very strong and very clear.
THE ORIGINAL — in Spanish
Nada te turbe,
nada te espante,
todo se pasa,
Dios no se muda.
La paciencia
todo lo alcanza;
quien a Dios tiene
nada le falta:
sólo Dios basta.
THE ORIGINAL — in English
Let nothing disturb you,
let nothing frighten you,
all things pass away:
God never changes.
Patience obtains all things.
Whoever has God
lacks nothing.
God alone suffices.
THE UNITY REWORK — Declarative Affirmations
Let nothing disturb me.
Let nothing frighten me.
All things pass away.
God never changes.
God, you dwell in me. I am grateful.
The Understanding given tonight holds.
I shall not be overcome.
Nada te turbe.
Nada te espante.
Sólo Dios basta.
Let nothing disturb me.
Let nothing frighten me.
God alone suffices.
Lord, we give you thanks.
Thank you that a breath is enough. That an open hand is enough. That the eyes of our understanding are being enlightened even when we cannot feel it happening.
Thank you that trust holds. It is our shelter tonight, our walls and roof, the door we walked through to be here. The chair we sit on, the dim light of night we rest in.
Thank you for Teresa, and Brother Lawrence, and Merton, and Julian, and Bonaventure — for all of those who surrendered and endured in prayer. We have borrowed the faith held in their prayers again tonight, and it has been wonderful. Thank you for these records and publications.
Thank you that we shall not be overcome.
Paul wrote from shipwreck and imprisonment, and he was certain of this:
Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:38–39.
Go from here knowing our faith holds.
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.
Matthew 6:9–13, New International Version.
The light of God surrounds us.
The love of God enfolds us.
The power of God protects us.
The presence of God watches over us.
Wherever we are, God is.
James Dillet Freeman, ‘Prayer of Protection,’ 1947.
Tihei mauri ora.
Prepared by Jacinda Faloon-Cavander for Unity of NZ