A Prayer by William Barclay
O God, you have given me a very difficult job to do within your
Church.
Help me never to face these young people unprepared.
Help me to be absolutely honest with them. Help me never to dodge
their
questions, and never to evade their problems.
Help me to try to understand them before I criticize them.
Keep me from the foolishness of looking for old heads on young
shoulders, and help me to remember that the ways of one generation are
not the ways of another, and that things are different since I was their age.
Help me never to laugh at them, and never to lose patience with
them.
Help me to be wise enough to know when they need control and discipline,
and when it is better to let them have their own way.
Help me to help them to think, to worship and to pray.
Help me to remember that, whether I like it or not, and whether I
know it
or not, they will judge the Church by me, and that this is the grave
responsibility that is laid upon me.
Even if I see no result, help me not to be discourage. Help me to
remember that it takes a long time for a seed to become a tree, and help
me to sow the seed and to leave its growth to you.
Grant that what I am may never undo all that I say. You have given
me this part
of your work to do--help me to do it well.