Practical Prayer

CAROLINE LUKE and her husband Chad M. Luke have been married for 22 years and live in Houma with their four children. Caroline serves as the Campus Minister at Vandebilt, where she also teaches New Testament and World Religions to tenth-graders. They are parishioners of St. Francis de Sales Cathedral. 
 
I remember the Christmas my oldest son got the LEGO set of his dreams: The Star Wars Millennium Falcon. It took him almost a full week to put together. He was so proud. A few days later, disaster struck when his baby brother got his hands on this wondrous creation and smashed it to bits. He was devastated, angry and had vowed never to touch LEGOS again. His Dad offered to fix it for him. All he needed to do was give it over to him completely. He couldn’t leave out a single broken piece. His dad needed it all to make things whole again. He did give it all over to him, and the tears stopped instantly. He was at peace. He knew Dad would fix it. This is what the “Surrender Novena” is meant to do for Christians. We give the broken pieces of our lives to Jesus, holding nothing back, knowing that He is the only one who could put it all back together for us.
 
The “Surrender Novena” originated from the words of Jesus revealed to Fr. Don Dolindo Ruotolo. He was an Italian priest who lived from 1882-1970 and was the friend and spiritual director of Padre Pio. Fr. Ruotolo learned the beauty of complete surrender to Jesus through much pain and suffering. He was affectionately known as “Mary’s Little Old Man,” and Padre Pio called him a “saint” and said the “whole of Paradise” was in his soul. He grew in love for Jesus through His sufferings, not asking to be freed from them, but surrendering every drop of it to Jesus. He understood that Jesus was the “Divine Physician,” and just as we should not tell the doctor how to heal us, we should trust Jesus to know how best to make us whole. This is why Fr. Ruotolo was able to have so much peace and joy through his trials. He always trusted that Jesus was working it all out for his good and the good of those entrusted to him.
 
This is precisely why this novena is so powerful and associated with countless miracles. It teaches us that prayer should not be a “honey-do” list for God. We should not tell God what to do and how to do it. We should lay our problems at His feet, trusting in His Wisdom and His plan. We should never leave prayer worried. We cannot expect God to fix a situation and then take charge and try to fix it ourselves. We become obstacles to Him, and He will not work when we are in His way. He respects our free will and waits patiently until we leave it all to Him and step away in trust. After prayer, we should be at peace and have joy knowing that He has it handled. Then, we can sit back and watch the Master at work. This is faith.
 
The “Surrender Novena” is a call to complete trust that Jesus knows better than we do how our lives should look and what is good for us. He cannot act if we don’t give him everything. We cannot hold on to our worry, anxiety, unforgiveness and anger and expect him to fix our lives. No. We must be like my son and give him every piece, trusting completely that Dad will fix it. And He will fix it better than we ever could. This is how we grow to be “like little children,” so we can become “the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 18:1-3).
 
Whatever your concerns are this season, give them to Jesus. Give Him everything. Trust him. Surrender it all to Him. Have Peace. And watch the Master work.
 
Caroline Luke
 
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The Surrender Novena
 
Day 1
Why do you confuse yourselves by worrying? Leave the care of your affairs to me and everything will be peaceful. I say to you in truth that every act of true, blind, complete surrender to me produces the effect that you desire and resolves all difficult situations.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 2
Surrender to me does not mean to fret, to be upset, or to lose hope, nor does it mean offering to me a worried prayer asking me to follow you and change your worry into prayer. It is against this surrender, deeply against it, to worry, to be nervous and to desire to think about the consequences of anything.
It is like the confusion that children feel when they ask their mother to see to their needs, and then try to take care of those needs for themselves so that their childlike efforts get in their mother’s way. Surrender means to placidly close the eyes of the soul, to turn away from thoughts of tribulation and to put yourself in my care, so that only I act, saying, “You take care of it.”
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 3
How many things I do when the soul, in so much spiritual and material need, turns to me, looks at me and says to me, “You take care of it,” then closes its eyes and rests. In pain you pray for me to act, but that I act in the way you want. You do not turn to me, instead, you want me to adapt to your ideas. You are not sick people who ask the doctor to cure you, but rather sick people who tell the doctor how to. So do not act this way, but pray as I taught you in the Our Father: “Hallowed be thy Name,” that is, be glorified in my need. “Thy kingdom come,” that is, let all that is in us and in the world be in accord with your kingdom. “Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven,” that is, in our need, decide as you see fit for our temporal and eternal life. If you say to me truly: “Thy will be done,” which is the same as saying: “You take care of it,” I will intervene with all my omnipotence, and I will resolve the most difficult situations.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 4
You see evil growing instead of weakening? Do not worry. Close your eyes and say to me with faith: “Thy will be done, You take care of it.” I say to you that I will take care of it, and that I will intervene as does a doctor and I will accomplish miracles when they are needed. Do you see that the sick person is getting worse? Do not be upset, but close your eyes and say, “You take care of it.” I say to you that I will take care of it, and that there is no medicine more powerful than my loving intervention. By my love, I promise this to you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 5
And when I must lead you on a path different from the one you see, I will prepare you; I will carry you in my arms; I will let you find yourself, like children who have fallen asleep in their mother’s arms, on the other bank of the river. What troubles you and hurts you immensely are your reason, your thoughts and worry, and your desire at all costs to deal with what afflicts you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 6
You are sleepless; you want to judge everything, direct everything and see to everything and you surrender to human strength, or worse—to men themselves, trusting in their intervention—this is what hinders my words and my views. Oh, how much I wish from you this surrender, to help you; and how I suffer when I see you so agitated! Satan tries to do exactly this: to agitate you and to remove you from my protection and to throw you into the jaws of human initiative. So, trust only in me, rest in me, surrender to me in everything.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 7
I perform miracles in proportion to your full surrender to me and to your not thinking of yourselves. I sow treasure troves of graces when you are in the deepest poverty. No person of reason, no thinker, has ever performed miracles, not even among the saints. He does divine works whosoever surrenders to God. So don’t think about it any more, because your mind is acute and for you it is very hard to see evil and to trust in me and to not think of yourself. Do this for all your needs, do this, all of you, and you will see great continual silent miracles. I will take care of things, I promise this to you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 8
Close your eyes and let yourself be carried away on the flowing current of my grace; close your eyes and do not think of the present, turning your thoughts away from the future just as you would from temptation. Repose in me, believing in my goodness, and I promise you by my love that if you say, “You take care of it,” I will take care of it all; I will console you, liberate you and guide you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
 
Day 9
Pray always in readiness to surrender, and you will receive from it great peace and great rewards, even when I confer on you the grace of immolation, of repentance, and of love. Then what does suffering matter? It seems impossible to you? Close your eyes and say with all your soul, “Jesus, you take care of it.” Do not be afraid, I will take care of things and you will bless my name by humbling yourself. A thousand prayers cannot equal one single act of surrender, remember this well. There is no novena more effective than this.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything! (10 times)
Mother, I am yours now and forever.
 Through you and with you
 I always want to belong
 completely to Jesus.