United Church of Christ (national site)
I usually include the pastoral prayer for the week when I post my sermon, but I haven’t preached for the last two weeks (while we heard from seminary intern Ruth MacKenzie and guest worship leader Neal Hagberg). So here are the prayers from March 14 and 21.
Prayer for March 14, 2010
Holy One, we know that you hear the contents of our hearts even before we speak them to you; nonetheless today we offer prayers for our secrets.
We pray in thanksgiving for the memories we hold that are too precious to be shared with anyone else – those moments of love and light, of generosity, of luminosity, that exceed our ability to put into words. We hold them as mementos of grace, sacred souvenirs of amazing moments. Keep them alive, we pray, so that we never entirely forget their transforming power and our attendant awe.
We pray also for those memories that seem too dark to be shared with others. Do not let our fear or shame shield someone who has violated our souls or our bodies; do not let our pride or sadness deny the damage that has been done. Help us to find the healing relationships that will ease our remembered pain or despair, and to have the courage and trust to receive the gift of healing when it comes.
God of all truth, we ask you to expose the untruths that may be hiding in our secrets. Shine your light on our inner thoughts and brush away the cobwebs of confusion, forgetfulness, immaturity, and error that have muddied and muddled our thinking. Do not let laziness, fear, or nostalgia keep us from clarity of mind and heart.
God of the future, we also bring before you our secret yearnings. Protect and nourish the fragile dreams that are growing in our imaginations, we pray. Blow on the tiny embers of our aspirations so that they may ignite our compassion as well as our ambitions. And help us to find the companions with whom these worthy secrets may be shared.
All these things we pray in the name of the one who shares every secret, even Jesus the Christ, and we pray together now in the words that he taught us …
Prayer for March 21, 2010
God of all our days, this morning we ask for your presence and guidance on our spiritual journeys, our explorations of faith, and our struggles with religion.
You have sent us your Holy Spirit, but it is usually hard for us to hear the whisper of the Spirit in all the noisiness of our lives. Teach us to find the inner quiet that makes it possible to hear your still small voice, and strengthen our discipline to enter that quiet more often and more regularly.
You have sent us prophets to remind us of the dangers of human pride, power, and greed, but it is hard for us to heed them in the midst of a world that rewards these traits more often than it punishes them. Give us the clarity to see with a prophet’s eyes and to recognize the injustices that are around us; give us the prophet’s voice to speak truthfully and forcefully about them; and give us the prophet’s persistence to carry forward the work of peace, justice, and reconciliation.
You have sent us saints to provide models of healthy piety and holy lives, but it is hard for us to follow them in a world that makes light of things that cannot be seen or heard, bought or sold, won or lost. And so we pray for the courage to live simple and prayerful lives, celebrating the sacredness of the creation around us and the blessedness of the people around us. Grant us the grace of unselfconscious faith – faith that is expressed without apology but also without arrogance or haughtiness.
You have called us into your church, but it is hard to maintain a community of faith without becoming just another club or organization. Fill us with a passion for the Good News of the Gospel so that it infuses life into all that we do, and fill us with humility for all of the errors and omissions that we make along the way.
All these things we pray in the name of the one who invites us on the journey of faith, and whose life shows us the way of humility, compassion, and peace, even Jesus Christ, and we pray together now in the words that he taught us …
