Prayers for my friend Mara

(Icon of the Extreme Humility)

I came home after a good day at work

and a grocery run

(took a while to walk home, with all the bags)

to get an email from my dear friend Mara's parents.

*

My friend Mara

(named for privacy after Naomi)

is in hospital.

Her story is not mine, so I cannot really tell it here.

But please pray for her.

I am at a loss at how to help other than to ask all

I can for prayers, which is what her parents asked of me.

I did not realize the extent of her struggle

until she called unwell in the middle of the night a few weeks back.

*

I know this is a call for me to learn to love;

Mara has been one of my close friends for over ten years;

right now she needs friends and cannot fully

be present to me in the way she usually can be.

So I need to learn to love a friend without expecting the normal

'friend love' in return.

I thank God for His mercy and long suffering towards myself

and ask for prayers that I will learn how to love

in this situation.

It has been so strange for often I find myself wanting to

tell Mara about what is happening

but it is to her that it is happening;

I guess I feel a bit of grief in this; for now I need to be a friend to Mara

even though in a way she feels lost to me

in the friend she once could be in return.

*

Thank God for His mercy.

*

Christ loved us without anything in return;

His disciples feel asleep when Christ asked them to

watch with Him in His night in Gethsemane.

*

Mara is going through her own night right now;

I pray that I may be found awake

and at prayer.

Thank God lent is coming.

I ask your continued prayers for Mara,

whose presence has graced my life for over 13* years now.

*over 13 years is over 1/3 of my life