Tish Harrison Warren - Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep

InterVarsity Press
P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515-1426
ivpress.com

2021 by Tish Harrison Warren

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from InterVarsity Press.

InterVarsity Press is the book-publishing division of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, a movement of students and faculty active on campus at hundreds of universities, colleges, and schools of nursing in the United States of America, and a member movement of the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students. For information about local and regional activities, visit intervarsity.org.

Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

While any stories in this book are true, some names and identifying information may have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

The publisher can't verify the accuracy of website hyperlinks beyond the date of print publication.

Cover design and image composite: David Fassett
Images: space image: Level1studio / The Image Bank / Getty Images
shot of star field: John Owens / EyeEm / Getty Images
night sky watercolor: Khaneeros / iStock / Getty Images Plus

ISBN 978-0-8308-4680-1 (digital)

ISBN 978-0-8308-4679-5 (print)

This digital document has been produced by Nord Compo.

To Raine, Flannery, and Augustine

May God keep watch with you through
every dark night and teach you, day by day,
that it is all for loves sake.

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your loves sake. Amen.

IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT, covered in blood in an emergency room, I was praying.

We had lived in Pittsburgh for less than a month. Amid frigid nights and snow that had turned to gray slush, I was miscarrying.

Earlier that night, we had joined new acquaintances at their house for dinner. Their daughter went to school with ours. I was two days into the miscarriage, but my doctor had told me to go about the week as planned, so we went. As my husband, Jonathan, made the kind of awkward small talk you rehearse with near strangers, I began to have contractions. I felt like I couldnt quite breathe. I asked to go to an urgent care clinic. I was trying to be breezy and undramaticnot the emergency room, but urgent care, the place where people go for stitches, no big deal.

Jonathan began to explain to our hosts that we had to end the evening early because, though we hadnt mentioned it over dinner pleasantries, I was in the middle of a miscarriage, and while I was supposed to be bleeding slowly for a week, now I was bleeding quickly and in pain. I stood apologizing to our dinner hostsbecause as a woman from the South, there is no awkward social situation in which I wont compulsively apologize. Then, suddenly, I began gushing blood. Gushing. I looked like a gunshot victim.

Our hosts threw two towels to my husband, which he wrapped around me as I stumbled into the car, shouting, Where is the hospital? We left our children upstairs playing, without saying goodbye, with people whose last name we couldnt quite remember.

It was dark out now. We wound through blurred city lights and hip college students walking to bars. On the way to the hospital I felt faint. Blood quickly soaked both towels as Jonathan offered panicked prayers: Help her! Breathe. Oh God. He ran all the red lights. He thought I was going to die on the way.

But we made it to the hospital. I was going to be okay, but I needed surgery.

The room filled with nurses, all commenting that this was way more blood than they usually saw, which should have been discomforting, except they seemed calm about it, even a bit fascinated, like I was a particularly well-done project at a school science fair. They put in a line for a blood transfusion, and told me to lie still. Then, I yelled to Jonathan, lost amidst the nurses, Compline! I want to pray Compline.

It isnt normaleven for meto loudly demand liturgical prayers in a crowded room in the midst of crisis. But in that moment, I needed it, as much as I needed the IV.

Relieved to have a direct command, Jonathan pulled up the Book of Common Prayer on his phone and warned the nurses, We are both priests, and were going to pray now. And then he launched in: The Lord grant us a peaceful night and a perfect end.

Over the metronome beat of my heart monitor, we prayed the entire nighttime prayer service. I repeated the words by heart as waves of blood flowed from me with each contraction.

Keep us as the apple of your eye.

Hide us under the shadow of your wing.

Lord have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.

Defend us, Lord, from the perils and dangers of this night.

We finished: The almighty and merciful Lord, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, bless us and keep us. Amen.

Thats beautiful, one of the nurses said. Ive never heard that before.