Sunday, July 24, 2011
Offered by Judith L. Watt, Associate Pastor

Great God, loving Savior, Ground of our Being, grant us thankful hearts this day—for the gift of life itself, for the gift of new life, for the gift of a community of faith, for the beauty of this world, for the opportunity of summer, for family, for friends. Help us, even if only for a moment, to truly lift up our hearts, to imagine ourselves doing that—lifting up our hearts and turning them toward you—so that you can soften the many hard places and open us up to the love you have for each one of us.

We carry many burdens, and so we pray for those with worries about jobs and money. Bring them a peace that passes all understanding and a hope that doors might open to new paths. For those with the challenges of care-giving for parents or for children with special needs, we ask for strength and for company and even for a sense of humor. For those with long-festering emotional wounds, we ask for a provision of grace and healing. We pray for people who are ill, that they might be healed, and we ask your loving saving presence with those who are in their last days of life. By the power of your Spirit make known to them the promise of eternity; make real to them the promises of faith.

O God, this world groans in need of you. Fear takes its hold, and suspicion takes over and people, for whatever reason, kill innocent people. We pray for the country of Norway, where lives have been senselessly lost by the hands of someone who thinks he knows what you call truth. Come into the lives of the families who grieve, and come into the life of the one who killed, and heal all of us from our mistrust of the stranger.

We pray for our president and national lawmakers, that they would hear one another and find a way to both reduce debt and more adequately provide for the poor and the helpless, the aging and the disabled. Make our leaders bold in their creativity. Make them compassionate in their actions.

Patient God, you know we are a people in a hurry. We move through life so fast that we miss signs of your kingdom. They exist. They are ours to behold. So help us understand the kind of world you proclaimed for us in Jesus’ patient teaching about the kingdom of heaven. Help us to see the signs and to be partners with you in making those signs visible. With grateful hearts, we are privileged to pray again the prayer Jesus taught his disciples, saying together, Our Father . . .

Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church