BINDING SOUL AND SOURCE
Prayers for the Church Street Family
March 25, 2021
Rev. Dr. Jan Buxton Wade
Windblown and wavering, we have made it through this rain-drenched day. Thanks be to you, Nurturing God, who sends both sun and showers that the earth itself might be reborn! Even amid the dark clouds you are exhaling newness and grace. We praise you for befriending us and for calling us homeward in the dimming light.
You have made us our brother’s keeper and our sister’s also; therefore, we pray you would touch with your mercy all who have experienced extreme pain in recent days: the Asian families whose loved ones met their deaths at the hand of a bigot; the slain teenagers in our city whose murders have left their families and friends in despair; the stunned relatives of the slain victims in Colorado; and all the repressed and brutalized ones across the globe. Give us wisdom and courage, we pray, that we might help break this chain of misery. And as we remember all who are bound in the grip of evil, we also remember these in our church family who express their own wounds and their own thanksgivings:
- Prayers appreciated: Cherished mother died peacefully yesterday at 104
- Family of four celebrates vaccination help from church
- Thanksgiving for work of our Stephen Ministers
- Praises: Family of three are steadily improving from Covid
- Prayers for loving family carrying a heavy burden
- Comfort for member in hospice care and his family
- Prayers that a son’s upcoming Covid test will be negative
- For a son to seek help for his alcoholism
- God’s work in reconciling a broken relationship
- Prayers for alcoholic son in first week of detox
- Upholding church families in mourning
- Healing for two who are suffer with lymphoma
- Proper diagnosis of ill first-grader
- Peace for one facing prostate surgery
- Grace and peace for husband facing third hip replacement
- Healing for dear friend, relief from depression
- Prayers for healing from eye surgery
Soon eager hands will be trimming palm branches, and crowds will swell to hail the coming of God’s own Son. In homage to this Humble One, even cloaks and olive branches will be spread along his path to the city gates. Grant that we would be there also, Lord, waving our palms in hope; but rather than spreading cloaks at the roadside, let us prostrate ourselves, contrite in spirit, praying for courage to travel with Jesus each of his final days. It will be a bitter trek, yet this leg of the journey is the straightest route to discovering for ourselves the cost of discipleship.
Gather our prayers in the stillness, Holy One, as we prepare to rest under your umbrella of protection. And as we sleep, we ask that we might we empty ourselves of everything that keeps us from following you. Then, arising with freer souls, we will meet you at the edge of tomorrow, palm branch at the ready, to begin our travels afresh.
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.
