Prayers of the People: Luke 10: 38-42

Here’s a prayer of intercession inspired by Luke 10: 38-42, the story of Mary and Martha’s encounter with Jesus.  It was written by Keith Howard.

Prayer of Intercession
(inspired by Luke 10: 38-42)

Our God, we give you thanks:

For those who have gone before us and from whose questions,
struggles to know and wisdom we benefit.
Thank you for the Mary and Martha’s of our life and our church.

For the gifts of new possibilities that await … just there …
in spite of our distraction

For those who see things we cannot
because of our fear, our experience, our knowing …

For those who wonder in ways that surprise us,
invite us and challenge us

For those who work so hard and continue to do so
even when we take them for granted, when we betray them,
when we neglect to treat them with justice or respect,
when we assume and presume and then are shocked at their rebellion

Our God, we give you thanks that it is not all about us,
that you continue to care and to love
and to create possibilities of redemption and new life
not only here among us but throughout your world.

Help us get over ourselves enough
to be able to sit in your presence, like Mary

Help us to have the humility and the courage to wonder,
if only for a moment, if you are about something game changing

Help us to carry that same spirit or curiosity and discovery
beyond these walls into the world in which we serve and which you love.

So let us, in your name, dare to hope

Let us dare to hope
For peace in the Middle East

That no child will go to sleep hungry and none will find shelter under a piece of cardboard

That violence will be absent from families

Let us dare to hope that you have not forgotten even us,
even at this place and time in our lives.

Make us a dangerous people – for once not to each other
but to all those resentments, preconceptions
and reasons why your future should not be the future,
for your church AND for your creation.

We only dare such craziness
because we sit in the presence of One whose prayer we echo.
Our father….
Amen.

 ~ written by Keith Howard, and posted on Keith Howard.ca http://keithhoward.ca/2010/09/07/167/
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