Reconciling Prayer

This is a prayer I shared at Capitol Hill United Methodist Church on June 14, 2020 as we celebrated becoming a Reconciling Congregation in 2005. 

O God of grace and God of glory,
on Your people pour Your power.
We need Your power to navigate these challenging times.
Even when it is time to celebrate,
we find it hard to find Your peace and joy.

Lord, in Your love – HEAR OUR PRAYER.

As we look to our biblical ancestors, O God
I’m reminded of how You invited the Israelites
into a covenant to be a light to the nations.
And yet, throughout history we see how
they have been persecuted
simply for being born Jewish.
To this day many still experience discrimination.
And so today, we join the voices of so many
who have gone on before when we ask, “How long?!”
How long must Your people endure pain at the hands of the world?

Lord, in Your love – HEAR OUR PRAYER.

And Lord, we look to the unrest here in the United States
as our black and brown siblings have for centuries
been abused by the insidious power of racism,
simply for the color of their skin.
Though they are created in Your image, O God,
many still treat these, Your children, as somehow “less than.”
And so today, we join the voices of so many
who have gone on before when we ask, “How long?!”
How long must Your people endure pain at the hands of the world?

Lord, in Your love – HEAR OUR PRAYER.

And loving God, on this day when we celebrate
this church’s step to openly welcome and empower our LGBTQ+ siblings
for ministry in the church and out into the community
we are reminded that these Your children, created in Your image
have also been seen as somehow “less than” or even “wrong”
for being who You created them to be.
And these beloved siblings have experienced discrimination,
oppression, and persecution through the centuries.
And so today, we join the voices of so many
who have gone on before when we ask, “How long?!”
How long must Your people endure pain at the hands of the world?

Lord, in Your love – HEAR OUR PRAYER.

And even as we cry out, “How long?!”
we believe what the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr said,
“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
We trust that through Your love, the example of Christ,
and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit
that change is possible
and that You invite us into a covenant
to help bend that arc towards the end that You are drawing all of us to.
So, to our crying ask of “How long?!” we add
“Here we are, send us to be Your light to the nations”
but particularly to our black and brown and LGBTQ+ siblings.

Lord, in Your love – HEAR OUR PRAYER.

O Lord, we join all these prayers we have shared today with the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples to pray saying:

Our Father,
who art in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name.
Thy kingdom come,
and thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil
for Thine is the kingdom
and the power
and the glory forever.
Amen.