Disturb Us?

Sir Francis Drake, an adventurer and essentially legal pirate, wrote this prayer in 1577 as he departed Portsmouth, England on the Golden Hind to raid Spanish gold on the west coast of South America.

He ventured at least as far north as the non-Spanish parts of California, claiming it as "New Albion" [New England] and returned to his Queen (the long way - via circumnavigation of the world) with loot worth over a half million pounds sterling receiving his knighthood for it. Special thanks to Tom Hughes for sharing it with me.

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
with the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wilder seas
Where storms will show Your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask you to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push back the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

This we ask in the name of our Captain,
Who is Jesus Christ.