Sunday, January 30, 2011
Offered by Calum I. MacLeod, Executive Associate Pastor

We are an impatient people, O God,
used to instant gratification,
rational explanation, lightning-fast communication;
we expect to get our own way, make plans for the future,
be in charge of our own destiny.

And you come to us hidden, mysterious, oblique;
our words and concepts cannot contain you,
much as we would wish otherwise,
but you do not allow us to be in control,
you, O God, who speaks out of the whirlwind of our lives.

You offer us hints of your power
but call us to faith in the unseen.

We sense your presence in the vastness of the cosmos,
in creation, which speaks not of a one-time act,
way back in the time before Big Bang,
but of a God who continues to create,
who holds our very being in your sustaining Being.

And in Jesus, the good shepherd,
we have received your gift of revelation;
in his life, ministry, death, and ultimate triumph over death
you have spoken to us of love, self-giving love,
love poured out
that we might live lives rooted and grounded in that life-giving love.

And we try to, O God. Believe us, we try.

Yet we find much in our world that is not life and love,
but brokenness, violence, destruction.

We lament brutalizing violence in the streets of our cities, O God.
We recognize and repent of our engagement with structures
that marginalize whole groups of people in the world.
We pray for the in-breaking of peace in lands
where war has become the staple of life.

And we know, O God, that in all your hiddenness and mystery,
we yet see you each day, in the eyes of the sick and the frail,
in the hearts of those who face death and those who mourn,
in the hands that bring mercy, pity, peace, and love into this world.

And for the world we pray with the prayer Jesus taught us, Our Father . . .

Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church