Prayer

Right, Wrong and Holy (Luke 10:25-37)

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Gracious God, we confess that we sometimes tell others,
we will keep them in our thoughts and prayers.
And maybe we do say a prayer.
But maybe we should also be doing something for them.
Help us, Lord, to see what those around us need and want.
Help us take the opportunity to provide that support,
to fulfill that need.
Help us to display your love to them through our presence.

As your followers, you told us to love our neighbor as our self.
Help us to truly see our neighbors.
In this world of divisiveness,
open our hearts so we can listen and find common ground.
Give us the willingness to talk with our neighbor,
to understand their needs, their fears and their dreams.
Give us the understanding that we are all your children,
equal in your sight, each of us deeply loved and uniquely cherished.
Help us to recognize that needing help is not a sign of weakness.
And help us to realize that when providing help,
it is important to know what help is needed.

As your followers, we have joined into your community of believers.
We come together in this sacred space to share our love for you,
to support one another and to learn from each other.
As we care for each other, we ask that you also be with those
among us who need your healing grace and strength.
We name ___.
And as a community of faith, we celebrate the joys of those among us.
We lift up ___.
We thank you for bringing us together as a community
to share in the good times and the bad.

Gracious God, we know that our situations change,
sometimes suddenly without warning.
We can be the Samaritan or
we can be the victim by the side of the road.
But we know that you are with us always,
no matter where we find ourselves.
And, we know that we are to share your good news
with others and to share your love with all.
As we celebrate your presence among us,
we lift up our voices using the words that your Son taught us,
“Our Father…”

Respect, Peace, Encouragement, Thankfulness and Prayer (1 Thessalonians 5: 12-24 )

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Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.

These are words that may not occur often in our daily lives.
Our political climate highlights mistrust with our elected officials.
Financial institutions have failed us.
Corporations seek profit over environmental safety and
short-term profit over job security for employees.
Even our religious institutions have caused pain rather than
building peace and unity.
Fear seems to be the strongest emotion in today’s world.

As we come together this morning, here in this sacred place,
remind us, Gracious God, that we are your people, your children.
Each of us has a role to play in this body, in your church.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
May these be the words that we think of when we think of our church,
when we look around at the faces of those around us.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
May these words describe how we treat others in our daily lives.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
May these be the words that we inspire in those we encounter.

Be with us, all loving and powerful God.
Remind us to always seek to do good for others,
help us to resist returning evil for evil.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
May these words be our daily mantra,
here within our church and outside in our community.
We have come together, as your followers, as your believers.
We trust in your teachings and we lift up our worries,
our fears and our concerns to you, Gracious God.
We ask that you be with ___ and to share your strength and
healing grace with them.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
Open our hearts and minds so that these words become our habits of behavior.
Respect, peace, encouragement, thankfulness, and prayer.
Your son modeled these behaviors for us and now we use the words
he taught us, lifting our voices up in prayer to you,
“Our Father…”

Listening for You (Luke 10:3842)

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Our world is a busy and chaotic world.
So many different things compete for our attention.
It can be hard for us to hear our own thoughts,
to take a moment to just be.
And, sometimes, we spend more time
dealing with day to day tasks
than we do in daily prayer and meditation.

In the morning, when we first wake,
before we think about our first to-do,
help us to give you thanks for a new day and a new beginning.
Help us to be present with you in the early morning quiet.
Open our hearts to your will in our lives.

During our day, as we cross items off our to-do list,
remind us to spend time with you again.
Open our ears to those we encounter during our day,
especially those who we may not know well or
who have different life experiences than ours.
Help us to be present with them and to truly hear their story,
and help us to hear the words that they leave unspoken.
What are they afraid to share with us?
Remind us that the gift of our attention is sometimes
the most valuable gift we can give to someone.
Help us to be present with you in the busy of our day.
Open our hearts to your will in our lives.

As we spend time with our friends and families,
remind us that this time is precious in our lives.
In what seems like moments rather than years,
children grow and become teenagers and then adults,
spouses and our relationships with them evolve,
and parents age and require assistance.
Help us to be present with our family,
to truly listen to their story and to know them fully.
Remind us that our time and our attention is worth more
than any material gift.
Help us to be present with you within the love of our family.
Open our hearts to your will in our lives.

As our day draws to an end, remind us again
to hear your voice in the quiet of the night.
As we think back over our day,
help us to hear when you spoke to us throughout the day.
Help us to be present with you in the stillness of the night.
Open our hearts to your will in our lives.

Ever-loving God, you are always present with us.
As we support each other, we ask that you be with those among us
who need some additional support and strength.
We name ___
And, while we seek out your voice in our daily lives,
we lift up our voices using the words Jesus taught us,
Our Father…”

I Believe in Peace

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Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

Do not worry. Lord, it is hard not to worry.
So much is going wrong in our world.
We can feel powerless to make effective changes in our world.
And during the Advent season, when we should be focused on you,
we spend our time worrying about Christmas decorations and family traditions,
getting the right presents for those on our list,
and fulfilling our own and others expectations.
But our expectations can be so unrealistic during the holiday season.

Do not worry.
Lift up our concerns in prayer and let our requests be known to you.
Lord, it is hard not to worry.
No matter how much we believe in you,
we don’t want to give up our worries, our fears, to you.
We pray to you and ask for your help, for your healing and your grace.
But yet, we still worry. We cling tightly to our fears and concerns.

Calm our minds, Lord. Open our hearts to your peace and healing.
Relax our tension-filled bodies and remind us to breathe deeply.
Your peace, Lord, reminds us that when we worry,
we change our focus to what is not important.
If we worry about a Christmas tradition or
meeting someone’s expectations of the holiday,
we are not focusing on the reason for the holiday – the gift of Your Son.
When we worry about the future, we are missing out on the present.

Remind us, Lord, that it is Your will that should and will be done.
Give us the peace to accept the here and now, to live in the here and now,
and to let the future take care of itself.
We lift our concerns to you, Lord,
and know that all of our requests and worries can be lifted up to you.
When we are lost, we can trust that in You, we will be found.
We have found peace in your teachings and
in your love and acceptance.
When we doubt, remind us that Mary, a pregnant teenager
who could have faced public ridicule and scorn,
accepted the news of her virgin birth and the long trip to Bethlehem with peace
and acceptance.
She did not give in her fears and worries, but instead felt joy and peace.

We will not worry, Lord.
We lift up our prayers to you, giving you our fears and pain.
We open our hearts and our minds to your peace.
We accept and celebrate the here and now, and trust in the future,
in your future.

I Believe in Joy

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I believe in God even when he is silent.

My days can be very busy, Lord.
The noise of today’s world is loud and chaotic.
The demands on my attention drown out my own thoughts, much less your voice.
I confess, Lord, that I may not be listening to you and
I don’t always notice the silence.

I believe in God even when he is silent.

When things in my life are going well, Father,
I may not seek you out as often as I should.
But in the dark of night, when my fears are the loudest,
I am mindful of the silence.
When illness or injury strikes,
I am reminded of my weakness and the fragileness of life.
The news reminds me there is evil in the world.
When tragedy strikes, we ask why.
Where were you, Father?
How could you permit such terrible things to happen to innocent people?

I believe in God even when he is silent.

The silence can be deafening at times.
Mother God, we plead with you at these times.
Make our loved ones well again.
Give us one more chance to make amends,
one more time to make a relationship work.
We bargain with you and offer up promises and sacrifices if you will only,
just this time, give us what we are asking for.

We believe in God even when he is silent.

It is only later, Lord, that we realize that you were not silent at all.
It was us, all along. We could not hear you or see you.
During tragic times, we see later that you were there with us.
You were there in the form of a community who came together
to mourn with the fallen.
You were there with the strangers, the friends,
and the family who gave us strength to make it through our challenges.
You were there in the form of the unanswered prayers that in the end
were the best answer we could have been given.

You were there, Lord. You have always been there.
We know that you will always be there.

We believe in God.

We Thank You (Exodus 2)

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For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today because we want to believe in You,
we want to follow your teachings.
Some of us believe the scriptures are black and white.
Others see the gray.
For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today,
because we know that we are the children of God.
We may feel adrift as if we are in a papyrus basket, bobbing along in the waves
but we know that you have a plan for us, Father.
For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today and we know that we make up the body of Christ.
It is up to us to make this world your world.
It is up to us to reach out to those among us,
to those who are marginalized and powerless,
to those who are hungry and in need,
to those who need a helping hand and
to those who are in pain.
For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today and we know that you are also here today.
You are with us and you were with our ancestors,
giving us and them the strength to fulfill your teachings.
We know that you will be with our children and with their children.
We ask that you be with ___ now as they could use your support and strength.
For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today and we lift our hearts and minds to you.
Give us the courage to speak up for those among us who have no voice,
the strength to carry the burdens of those who are feeling weak
and the compassion to feel the pain of those who are hurting and alone.
For all the ways in which God moves through us… We thank you, God!

We are here today and we will be here tomorrow as we were yesterday.
As your children, we look to you for strength and for forgiveness.
As your children, we know the power of prayer, and we use the words your Son taught us:
“Our Father…”

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What We Discern (Ephesians 5:15-20)

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We gather here today in this sacred space.
We have chosen to spend our time here today,
with you and with one another.
For this few moments,
we quiet our thoughts,
we open our hearts,
and we focus on your word and your teachings.
Remind us to take this time throughout the week,
to spend time with you every day,
to feel your presence in our daily interactions,
to hear your teachings as we make our choices,
and to see your image in the faces of those we meet.
Remind us to speak with love, not judgement.
Remind us to listen to the stories of each other
allowing them the time they need to feel truly heard.

We gather here today in this sacred space.
We have chosen to spend our time here today,
with you and with one another.
For this few moments,
we quiet our thoughts,
we open our hearts,
and we focus on your word and your teachings.
It can be easy to focus on the things we do not have,
the things that cause us pain and worry,
the things that society tells us we should be doing.
Remind us to be grateful for what we have,
to spend our energies on what we can change and
to worry less about what we cannot control.
Remind us to share what we have with others
freely and without judgement.
Remind us that we are your children,
each of us deeply loved and uniquely cherished.
It is not up to society to judge us or to determine our worth.
Help us to become the best version of ourselves that we can be.

We gather here today in this sacred space.
We have chosen to spend our time here today,
with you and with one another.
For this few moments,
we quiet our thoughts,
we open our hearts,
and we focus on your word and your teachings.
We feel your presence among us
and we know that you are always with us.
Be with those among us who especially need your strength and grace,
naming __.
Remind us to also support each other, to share in each other’s joys and sorrows.
As we gather together here, as your children, we use the words Jesus gave us,
“Our Father…”