Today’s Prayer to Passage will be from the book “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” by Betty Smith.

Today I pray, “Dear God, When I lived in Brooklyn , New York, I had an early twenties energy of adventure and discovery. No longer in my twenties and no longer in New York, what energy of adventure and discovery am I living today and not noticing enough to appreciate? Amen.”

Following my prayer, I held the closed book in my hands and opened it to this passage:

“No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps, and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in the tenements districts…. That was the kind of tree it was. It liked poor people.”
—BETTY SMITH

No matter where I live, I am always filled with the energy of my new mission. I love to live in places where I can marvel at people. I walk among my neighbors and feel encouraged. My environments inspire me to look for ways in which I may provide a contribution. And in so doing, grow.