Posts Tagged ‘love’

Elections 2022

November 6, 2022

“. . . We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. O Lord, listen! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, hear and act.” Daniel 9:18-19

O Lord help us to be better than we are.

Quick to forgive and slow to anger (James 1:19-21), seeking the still and quiet space where we might hear your voice.

Give us the will and wisdom to seek out truth, to turn away from those who cause deceit to prosper (Daniel 8:25),

from those who use your name and dishonor you with their actions (Matthew 15:8).

Restore in us a vision of one country, working together, towards liberty and justice for all.

Raise among us those who will lead with love and compassion and calming words,

so that we may be at peace and together find our way.

Guide us O Lord.

Amen

related past prayers:

Freedom

Autocracy

Seeing

Anxious

Turning Point

Preserving Our Democracy

Guide Us Towards Peace

July 4th, 2022

July 4, 2022

Lord we thank you for our freedom and your many gifts.

O beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain.*

We thank you for opportunities to grow and for a prosperous land. Help us to share so that all might thrive.

For purple mountains majesty, above the fruited plain.

We thank you for the beauty and abundance with which we are surrounded. Let it inspire and encourage us to reach out to others and share your love.

America, America, God shed his grace on thee.

We thank you for your forgiveness and mercy. May we extend that to others, forsaking tribalism, factionalism, and hyper-partisanship. Help us to love our neighbors as ourselves. (Luke 10:25-37; Galatians 3:26-29).

And crowned thy good with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea.

We thank you Lord for the many diverse peoples that make up our country. May we see the richness of your creation in this diversity and resist those who would exploit our differences and sow division.

Help us Lord to use our freedoms wisely, overcoming evil with good and serving one another with love. (Romans 12:21; Galatians 5:13).

Guide us towards peace, O Lord.

Amen

*italicized lines from the hymn America The Beautiful

Other July 4 Posts:

Freedom, 2021

Preserving Our Liberties, 2020

Pray For Our Country, 2015

Freedom From Fear, 2013

Easter 2022

April 18, 2022

He has risen

giving us hope

that we too can love sacrificially,

strengthen our communities,

pursue justice, and

survive oppression,

together.

Hope

that we can change the world for our children – all children.

Hope

that they might thrive, finding

food, water, shelter, and opportunities to use the talents God gave them,

together.

Hope

that we might move towards love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control,

and away from the politics of power and control.

He has risen.

Alleluia!

Amen

Christmas 2021

December 25, 2021

The light shines in the darkness.

Help us to see.

To understand.

To share your truth.

To act in love.

To pursue peace.

Our hope is in that light.

The light shines through the darkness.

Amen

Advent 2021 Week 4

December 21, 2021

Lord, let your love flow in us and through us.

Heal us.

Help us.

Equip us to share your love.

To reach beyond ourselves.

To find a better way.

Guide us with your love O Lord.

Amen

Advent 2021 Week 3

December 17, 2021

We await O Lord, your justice.

The promise that our mourning will end,

Our fighting will cease,

And both the oppressed and oppressor will be freed to a new way,

A way of compassion, of truth, of caring and love.

And we rejoice in the knowledge that the time for justice will come. Is. 25:9.

Amen

Autocracy

July 11, 2021

Today’s prayer borrows from Psalm 83

See how the enemies of democracy are astir.

With cunning they conspire against your people; they plot against the freedoms you cherish.

“Come” they say. “Let us destroy this diverse nation, let democracy be no more.”

With one mind they plot together; they form an alliance against us.

All those who lie, those who deny justice, those who seek power at our expense,

Make them like tumbleweed, O Lord, like chaff before the wind.

As fire consumes the forest, or a flame sets mountains ablaze, so pursue them with your tempest and terrify them with your storm.

May their efforts perish in disgrace.

Cover their faces in shame, and let those who seek your love, your compassion, your mercy prevail.

Amen

Memorial Day 2021

May 31, 2021

This day Lord we remember and commit to your care all those who fought over the generations to save our world from tyranny and anarchy, and for those, both military and civilian, who are in the struggle still to preserve our democracy. John Dewey said that democracy needed to be reborn in every generation, and we confess Lord that we have been poor midwives. Help us recover and recommit to liberty and justice for all. Help us Lord extend your love and forgiveness to each other, and to move forward with care, particularly for the least among us. Amen

Seeing

May 16, 2021

Widen our lens O Lord, well beyond the narrow aperture of our phones.

Help us to lift our heads and see the beauty and the wonder of the world around us, and know that you are with us, that we are not alone nor in charge.

Help us to see your love and and forgiveness in the people around us, so that we too might respond with compassion and mercy.

Help us to see the many revelations of your grace that surround us, inviting us to move beyond our resentful and quarrelsome ways.

Open our eyes Lord to the possibilities of our future were we to work together.

Amen

Caring For Our Kids

May 2, 2021

Bless our children Lord.

When we were expecting, the doctor told us, “a child is God’s way of saying the world must go on.”

Help us change Lord, for their sake.

Protect them from a legacy of fear, hate, and resentment.

Instead let them know joy, peace, and opportunity.

Help them love and be loved by their fellow citizens.

Give us all hope.

Help us change Lord, that our children might more fully live.

Amen