Saturday, March 11, 2023

Today, we invite you to reread, rest and reflect on the prayers of the past week.

Lectionary Readings for Today:
1 Samuel 15:32-34
Psalm 23:1-6
John 1:1-9

Save us from ourselves. Give us ears to hear you, hearts to understand you, and wisdom to be like you. Give us the peace that can only come from relationship with you, so we may also be at peace with ourselves and each other.

We walk with you to the spaces in our landscape that represent grief and death to us. Jesus calls to these spaces. We hear him command that which is dead within us to come back to life. Dreams, desires, gifts, and visions that were once dead are caught in the breath of Life-giving Spirit and come forth within us.

Heal and guide us, O Yahweh. Protect us from ourselves. Create in us clean hearts, and renew a right spirit within us.

We enter your sacred prayer space throwing off our exteriors, these barriers that are full of deceitful and pious behaviours. We long to be genuine, to return to our true selves, the way you created us to be. We have learned how to put on a good show for others. But these are the ways of darkness. We seek a new path. We seek your path of life.

How many times, O Yahweh? How many times have we pushed against your mighty hand when you hold us in place, preventing us from making disastrous decisions that would lead us down a path of darkness and destruction? Only when we enter your sacred prayer space, do we realize the true nature of your strength. You use your strength to protect us, not to control us.