Heavenly Father,
you have prepared for all those who love you,
such good things as surpass our understanding;
pour into our hearts such love towards you,
that we, loving you above all things,
may obtain your promises,
which exceed all that we can desire;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
This collect is simple in form but, on examination, reveals the depths of the Christian experience. It begins by recognising the extent of God’s generosity to his people, echoing the language of Psalm 31:19:
How abundant are the good things
that you have stored up for those who fear you,
that you bestow
…on those who take refuge in you
and 1 Corinthians 2:9, which quotes Isaiah 64 and 65:
“‘What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived’—
the things God has prepared for those who love him.”
With these and other passages in the background, the collect reflects that God’s generosity is not just unimagined but unimaginable. The “good things” God has prepared “surpass our understanding”. The challenge of imagining how great God’s reward for his people might be, is beyond mere mortal capacities. We cannot comprehend the extent, the intensity, or the beauty of what God has prepared.
This introduces an implied problem. How can I, a mere mortal, really appreciate the good things of God?
The collect continues by asking God to fulfil in us the condition for being able to receive what God has prepared. It asks God to “pour into our hearts such love towards you, that we, loving you above all things, may obtain your promises”. Though, in the light of the great commandment, it might at first blush appear that this is a request for justification, the context of this collect itself and its context in the Book of Common Prayer, shows us that this is not what is in view. The lack which is seeking remedy here is not our moral unfitness to receive God’s promises but our lack of capacity.
The collect’s chief request, then, is that by “pouring his love into our hearts” God will enable his people to “love him above all things” and thus “obtain your promises”. Why is this the necessary remedy? Because what God offers to his people is not, first and foremost, something created, but himself. No wonder these promises go beyond our imagining! Only by loving God with the love that he gives, can we hope to truly enjoy the greatness of the blessing that he offers.
As Augustine put it in his commentary on Psalm 84: “It is no paltry thing that God will give to one who longs, but himself, who made all that exists; and no small effort must a lover make to be capable of receiving so great a good. Train yourself until you have a capacity for God; long and long for what you will possess for ever.”[1]
So pray this with me:
Heavenly Father,
you have prepared for all those who love you,
such good things as surpass our understanding;
pour into our hearts such love towards you,
that we, loving you above all things,
may obtain your promises,
Which exceed all that we can desire;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
[1] Saint Augustine (of Hippo, Expositions of the Psalms 73-98 (Vol. 4) (New City Press, 2002), 187.