Praying with Paul: 'Following His Example'

Dear Father, blessed bestower of grace,

As your servant I commend myself to you as your will may require: Through great endurance, if need be - afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, tumults, labors, staying awake, hunger! Through goodness - purity, knowledge, forbearance, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, and truthful speech. Through the power of God - with weapons of righteousness for the right hand and the left. In disparity - in honor and dishonor, in ill-repute and good-repute, treated as an imposter and yet true, as unknown and yet well-known, as dying, yet behold I live, as punished but not yet killed, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing and yet possessing everything!

In the name of Jesus, who suffered for us, I ask for the grace and will-power to live according to his example. Amen.