Many people are familiar with the prayer that begins “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.” It is part of the midday prayers at http://commonprayer.net/midday-prayers, so I pray it frequently.

The prayer feels too ambitious to me. “Where there is hatred, let me sow love.”

When I face hatred, I feel I am doing pretty good if I don’t fly into a rage and blast the hater myself. In other words, not returning a black eye for a black eye or a chipped tooth for a chipped tooth seems like a good day’s work to me.

Let me sow love? That sounds good and I would have happily prayed “Let me sow love” when I was young and inexperienced, but I’ve got some years on me now. Sowing love is hard. And love does not consistently defuse hate.

I’m not sure if the problem is that I am tired or afraid of the vulnerability that comes with love.

“Where there is injury, pardon.” I like the idea of pardon, but find actually doing it hard.

“Where there is doubt, faith.” My faith is so small most days.

“Where there is despair, hope.”

“Where there is darkness, light.”

“Where there is sadness, joy.”

I do not pray this prayer with confidence that I can deliver love, pardon, faith, hope, light, or joy. I pray that I may sow love where there is hatred because I want love. I hear the ring of truth in these words, “It is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”

I am tired and often afraid, but this looks like the right path to me.

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen.