The rhetoric and incivility of this week’s so-called “debate,” testify to our need for something more. For consolation because of the deplorable state of our nation’s leadership, and for those who suffer most because of its depravity. For direction for a way forward, something other than what we see on screens and hear from hubris. We need most desperately the comfort and command of our Father. And we, his children, to be what we are in Him, salt and light like the Son.
So we pray. We pray for direction and consolation and Christ-likeness together, through these words adapted from Earnest Campbell.
Father of all the families on earth, busy with every human being, believing in us more fully than we dare believe in ourselves,
grant us what we need to live more like Jesus:
a quiet mind,
a forgiving spirit,
indifference to wealth,
a humbler estimate of self,
a readiness to pray,
a clear vision of your purposes,
courage to do the right we know.
Command and comfort us, Father, for we need both direction and consolation. Then shall our order lives confess the beauty of your peace on earth as it is in heaven.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.