Weekly Prayers for the Church Street Family
Week of May 11, 2022
Rev. Jan Buxton Wade
O Light of Each New Day and Luster of Evening Star, we tremble when we consider how your goodness permeates every hour of every day! You have brought us safely to this point, as the curtain of dusk falls softly all around. And here in the shadows we ponder how your holiness has touched our encounters in this week just passed: the stranger that offered a helping hand, the promising report from a physician, the cheery note that arrived when most needed, the safe arrival at a destination, worship moments that filled our hearts to the brim, friends who demonstrated their concern, and also . . . . . . . . . . We thank you, Lord, for coming to us in such quiet graciousness; you slip in unheralded, so softly that we often overlook your presence. Ah, but here in these moments, we recall how your providence ever flows through circumstances, creating blessings where none are expected or deserved.
Faithful Spirit, receive our prayer.
Keeper of All Our Stories, you know the stories of our lives – of the times we failed miserably, when we chose the wrong roads, when we were betrayed, when we placed our trust in the wrong places and persons, when our dreams collapsed, the times when grief overtook us, when bitter tears were our food day and night. Even in these times, remembering your own story of suffering, you colored our hurts with your love, cradled us in your arms, told us that there is always a new beginning, and that your mercy would help us find it. As you gather us under your wings, remind us that all our stories begin and end in you, for you are also the Keeper of our Souls.
Faithful Spirit, receive our prayer.
You know us through and through, Lord, and we pray we might come to know ourselves in entirety as well. Surprise us with insights into our own assumptions and motives; give us wisdom to ask the most difficult questions of ourselves. Move us out of our complacency into a life of fullness.
Faithful Spirit, receive our prayer.
Accept, O Lord, these private prayers we carry in our hearts . . . . . . . . . . and also these praises and concerns offered by your people at Church Street:
- Gratitude: our gifted high school seniors who led Sunday worship
- Thankful that a husband with Parkinson’s is regaining strength
- Family celebrate a successful pacemaker procedure this week
- Blessed news of a daughter’s pregnancy
- One appreciates successful surgery & all who prayed
- Member gives thanks for a wonderful vacation
- Grateful for the Spirit’s presence in a mother’s peaceful death
- Thanksgiving for a son’s happy wedding last weekend
- One offers thanks for friends who offered help & wisdom in regard to an important decision
- Family thankful for daughter’s beautiful beach wedding on Saturday
- Gratitude: a member has overcome a second bout of Covid
- Grateful for prayers – cancer patient has not contracted Covid after exposure
- Two grateful for having overcome recent illnesses
- Prayers that innocents in Ukraine might be protected
- Wisdom for leaders of the free world to help end the war in Ukraine
- All who are grieving the deaths of loved ones
- Guidance for family making decisions following bereavement
- Courage & healing for member with advanced cancer & her family
- Wisdom & guidance for daughter facing a bitter divorce
- Husband with Parkinson’s, easing of depression & help with his caregiving
- Prayers for all young people making transitions this season & their families
- Prayers that a pathology report is clear
- Infirm member anxious about an upcoming physical evaluation
- Couple experiencing downturn in income, seek financial security
- Healing of an extreme voice ailment & the sufferer’s depression
- Continued prayers: friend injured in accident, remains in ICU
- Healing for two women with untreatable eye disease
- Addressing of poverty in our community
- Correct diagnosis for mother with heart condition
- Young man seeking work in college athletics
- For the Spirit to abide with family during memorial service on Saturday
- An uncle & grandmother in hospice care & their families
- An ill mother-in-law & concerned family, for recovery
Faithful Spirit, we would be channels of your light, mercy, and peace as we live out our days; so fill us with grace that we may open ourselves to be used in whatever ways you desire. And, as always, we offer all these things in the name of the Risen Christ, who taught us to pray:
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, 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.
