04/29/2026
One Monday morning, I was jogging along the Willamette River in Portland. The sun rose in a display of orange, pink, and purple so stunning I stopped to take it in, turning to a stranger to exclaim, “Are you seeing this? Wow!” I finished my run home awed by the God who paints such masterpieces.
Back home, I stepped onto my porch, my little sacred space for prayer — complete with Bible, journal, and candle. But the candle and my pen were missing. I quickly realized my 2-year-old son, Amos, had been at it again, fascinated by his dad’s spot. The candle was stuffed in the mailbox, half the beeswax peeled away. Quickly tidying up, I set things mostly right, although to my frustration, the pen was still lost.
As I sat again to pray, the irony struck me. That wonder at the sunrise — my awareness of a daily miracle — was swept away in a flash by something as small as a missing candle.
It made me ask:
How do I live in the light of God’s beauty after the sunrise is gone?
How does the awe of that holy moment shape my parenting, marriage, and life?
How does my life bear the fruit of prayer after I say “amen”?
Ordinary moments can bring the deepest awakening. For me, it wasn’t the sunrise’s majesty that truly changed me. It was the gentle nudge of the Spirit after I let the irritation of my disrupted prayer nook sour my attitude: I realized the sanctity of that space was increased, not diminished, by my son’s messy presence.
Prayer, at its best, is practice for dragging the glory of the sunrise into everyday places — marriage, parenting, friendship, work, rest, interruptions — and learning to live from heaven’s perspective.
May your eyes be opened to the grandeur of God, who keeps His promises even now, and may you find the fruit of prayer after “amen.”
-Tyler Staton
Where in your daily life might God be inviting you to carry the awe of a “sunrise moment” into an ordinary frustration or interruption?
