The Collect for the Twenty-Ninth Week in Ordinary Time

Almighty ever-living God, grant that we may always conform our will to Yours and serve Your majesty in sincerity of heart. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, Who lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

grant that we may always conform our will to Yours – This is an easy prayer to pray and a difficult calling to live. God's will is perfect. He knows us better than we know ourselves, and He sees infinitely farther in space and time then we do. We must be humble enough to recognize this and say “yes” to whatever God is doing or permitting in our lives, whether we understand it or not. As St. Paul says in Romans 8:28, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.” That said, though, we need God's grace to help us conform our will to His because we tend to rebel and complain and try to go our own way. This is why we pray as we do today, that our hearts open to grace and that grace moves our wills to join as one with His.

serve Your majesty – God created us to love and serve Him. Period. That is the whole purpose of our life, and it should be our highest joy. Yet it is so easy to get distracted by the things of this world. They tend to take priority over our service to God when they are actually given to us that we may use them to serve God.

in sincerity of heart – We humans are plagued by mixed motives. We love God and want to serve Him and please Him and conform ourselves to His will, but then we falter. We turn selfish. We want to be recognized and honored by others so that we feel better about ourselves. We fail to become transparent and allow God's light to shine through us. Rather, we block the light with our own desires and intentions. This is why we need to pray for sincerity of heart. Sincerity refers to a freedom from deceit and a truth in intention. We can never deceive God, but we must stop deceiving ourselves and allow God to purify our motives and our service with His grace and love.