Sunday, July 13, 2008
Offered by Adam H. Fronczek, Associate Pastor

God, in prayer, you invite us to tell you our stories. We sit upon your knee and we lay the joys and troubles of our lives before you. As we pray, you call us to the wholeness for which you created us, and you accept us for who we are. No secrets are kept from you, and no hopes for the future are too great.

So incline your ear to us, Lord. Hear us, as we call out to you.

Incline your ear to us as we praise you, O Lord, for we are so blessed, and we must give thanks. We thank you, on this beautiful morning, for the majesty of your creation and for the miracle of life and of living wherever it is found. With the grain of the earth and the fruit of the vine you sustain us, and you have created for us families and friends who support and comfort and encourage us. We give you thanks, for with each new day there are so many opportunities: chances to teach, to learn, and to grow; chances to nurture old relationships and begin new ones; opportunities to care for one another. We think of those whom we love, O Lord, and we thank you for the lives of those who chase after your purposes. We thank you for planting a seed in each one of us that we might feel called to do likewise.

Lord, incline your ear to us, for in the midst of the many blessings of this life, we still find ourselves a severely afflicted people in a severely afflicted world. Incline your ear, O Lord, unto those who find themselves alone in the world. Incline your ear unto those whose struggles go unheard. We pray for those who are lonely and without family and friends. We pray for your presence in broken homes and broken relationships. We pray for those who are caught in systems of overuse and abuse; we pray for those who fret over outward appearances, when what you desire is the beauty of our hearts. Incline your ear, O Lord, to those who are sick and who are dying. Make yourself known in the midst of illness that will not go away and wars that will not cease. Incline your ear, Lord, to hunger, poverty, and violence, and please, Lord, incline your ear to those who long for these things to end and don’t know how to begin to fix it.

Glory and honor and praise are yours, even in the midst of these struggles, O Lord, for your Word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. In the ancient stories of your people, we see families and friends who struggle together and find again and again that all of life belongs to you.

So, Lord, work in our world as you did in theirs. Where parents hope for a lost child, where revenge is an obsession, where betrayal is the rule, help us to look upon our brothers and sisters, parents and children, friends and neighbors, and even our enemies, and say to them, “To see your face is like seeing the face of God.”

In this hour, on this day, in this week and beyond, help us, O Lord, to see the path you have set before us and to set out upon it in haste. Lead us to reconciliation among family and friends, races and religions, peoples and nations. Lead us toward the healing of all that is broken. You show us the way, Lord; help us to follow it. Where we find betrayal in life, help us to seek forgiveness. As you incline your ear to us, Lord, so help us to incline our ears to you.

Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church