More From Linda Coggin

In today’s devotional, I wrote that I didn’t remember when I first encountered Psalm 56:3, the verse I learned to pray as a child to calm my fear. Maybe I heard the verse in Sunday school and I took it as my own. I wasn’t aware of what it meant to trust God, but for me it was enough to take refuge in those words.

I have continued a long-standing practice of praying verses back to God. Sometimes a verse or phrase stands out to me when I am reading scripture. Many times, friends have shared verses that are meaningful to them. Whatever the source, a verse seems to come to me when I most need it and stays with me through all kinds of circumstances. 

Almost 40 years ago, a friend shared a list of scriptures that she used to frame her prayer time each day.  The list began with Psalm 103:1-2. For many years, I began my morning prayers saying those verses so that now, I often wake up with those words on my mind: “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all his benefits” (NRSVUE). The verses remind me that God is present and to notice the benefits of that presence throughout my day.

Like many families, we’ve moved over the years and changed jobs as well as houses and cities. One summer facing another move, I noticed a post-it note on the bulletin board where I was volunteering. The handwritten note said, “God is my dwelling place.” I learned that the phrase was from Deuteronomy 33:27.  This verse accompanied me for next 10 years. And when we sold what we thought was our forever house and moved again, the verse was my prayer of assurance that I belonged to God, not to a house or job or specific town, and that under any circumstances the everlasting arms of God’s presence were there to hold me.

Five years ago, at age 65, my husband and I moved from the Southeastern United States to an Island in the Pacific Northwest of Canada. He was beginning a new job, and there were many unknowns as we moved far from our family and friends. I brought with me these verses that evoke prayers of trust when I am afraid, reminders of God’s benefits, and the assurance that God is my eternal dwelling place and that underneath me are those everlasting arms. Praying those verses gave me words to meet my fears because God will never leave me alone to face whatever happens.