Sunday, October 28, 2007
Offered by Calum I. MacLeod, Associate Pastor

O God, you summon the day to dawn;
you teach the morning to waken the earth.
For you the valleys shall sing for joy;
the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
For you the monarchs of the earth shall bow;
the poor and persecuted shall shout for joy.
Your love and mercy shall last forever,
fresh as the morning, sure as the sunrise.
Great is your name, O God.
Great is your love.

You loved the world so much, O God,
that in Christ you dwelt among us,
undertook suffering, pain and death,
and rose again triumphant from the grave.
And so with confidence in your
providing and sustaining grace,
we pray for the world and for your church

We pray for a world at war,
a war of bombs and guns and pain and suffering
where as always the poorest and the innocent
know the full brunt of the aggression of the powerful.
So be close, Lord, to those who mourn loved ones
in Iowa and Iraq,
in Kankakee and Kabul,
in Bloomington and Bethlehem.
Hasten the day, Lord, when the weapons of war
will be transformed into tools for harvesting food
and the war we wage is the war on hunger, poverty, and injustice.

We pray for our nation and for our leaders,
national and local, as they deal with outcomes
of natural disaster, human folly,
and our propensity to harm others.
We remember all affected by the fires in California,
and pray especially for our brothers and sisters
in Malibu dealing with the loss of their church building.
We pray that all who make decisions
impacting the common good
may be guided by the cry of your prophet,
“Let justice roll down like waters.”
We pray for our city in all its celebrations
and its struggles;
strengthen our engagement in and commitment
to the cause of making lives better.
We pray for our community:
bring healing to the sick,
wholeness to those who are mentally ill,
peace to the dying, and to the strong and well give strength and
wisdom to be harbingers of your kingdom.

Lord Jesus Christ, you built your church on the rock of redeemed humanity;
and we give thanks that through Peter and Paul,
through Augustine and Francis and Dame Julian,
through Luther, Calvin, and Knox,
through all the saints of every age,
you extended, reformed, and diversified
the household of faith.

We praise you for those in our own age
who brought honor to you by giving of themselves in the ultimate sacrifice.
We give thanks for Haining and for Bonhoeffer,
for King and Romero.

For all the saints who from their labors rest,
we give you thanks and praise.

And we who inherit their witness today
and reap what others have sown
bless you for our fathers and mothers in God.
Like them,
may we so love and serve your church
that those yet unborn
may benefit from our labor;
and when the grace of life on earth is past,
may we enjoy with them the company of heaven.

Our Father . . .

Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church