Here’s a beautiful prayer of intercession written by Bruce Prewer.
Prayers for Other People
The compassion of the Spirit of God within our hearts compels us to reach out in prayer to other people.
Let us pray.
From around the world we hear many children crying, O God;
crying for food and drink and someone to enfold them in loving arms.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us instruments of your peace.
We see the desolate eyes of refugees, O God;
plodding along war devastated roads,
or looking from transit camps, and from behind barbed wire,
for glimmers of hope.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
We read about the abused sisters and brothers, O God;
cringing from family violence,
or suffering in paddy-wagons and jails,
or assaulted in their own homes by strangers.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
We hear the sobbing of the broken hearted, O God;
betrayed by spouse or lover,
deserted by parents,
watching at the bed of the dying,
or following a hearse to the cemetery.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
We know about the disasters that afflict others, O God;
the bodies mangled in road accidents;
those devastated by disease or war,
and the minds that have cracked under pressure.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
We read about your church, O God;
in some places overcrowding its buildings,
in others battling to maintain services,
or in some countries meeting secretly behind locked doors.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
We look on the faces of both friends and enemies, O God.
Some of our friends are doing it hard,
while enemies seem to be getting it easy;
yet all are souls for whom Christ died.
Hear their prayers, dear Lord,
and make us the instruments of your peace.
Holy Friend, while we have been praying,
you have been busy answering our petitions
with an ineffable wisdom and an indefatigable love.
Thank you.
Through Christ Jesus our Saviour.
Amen!
— written by Bruce Prewer, and posted on Bruce Prewer’s Homepage. Visit his site for other wonderful lectionary-based worship resources.
For more worship resources about peace or justice, click on Peace Sunday resources or global justice in the list of “Labels” at the lower right side of the page.
For other prayers and prayer resources on this blog, see this Scriptural Prayer Index or this Topical Prayer Index.
