Here
is a prayer of intercession for Pentecost by Rev. Gord Waldie. It was posted on
the Worship Offerings website.
Prayers of the People
(inspired by the
events of Acts 2:1-13)
God
of wind and flame,
blow
into our lives.
Ignite the fire of hope, fan the flames of possibility.
Transform
us into a people who share your love with a world in pain,
a
people who proclaim your hope into a world given to despair,
a
people who live as though the world can be changed
into the kingdom that is to
come.
Baptizing
God, who calls us to be a baptizing community,
you
speak to us in many languages over the course of our lives:
the
burbles and laughs and wails of infancy,
the
indistinct speech and partial words of toddlerhood,
the
strange syntax and slang of late childhood and adolescence,
the
full language of adulthood,
the
quavering speech and muted tones of old age.
Speak
to us in the language that we need to hear today,
hear
us in the language that we speak.
God
of many languages.
You
sing the language of joy with us, you join us in the dance of life.
Hear
all of your children who sing and dance and praise this morning,
those
who celebrate new life with all the possibilities of the future,
those
who celebrate relationships,
both the new and exciting and the long-term yet
still exciting,
those
for whom the wonder of life fills their being to the limit,
may
they hear your voice joining in the singing and the shouting...
...time
of silence...
And
yet, God of life,
you
also speak the languages of pain, of sorrow, of fear, of despair.
Hear
all your children who speak, who wail,
who whisper in these languages this day:
those
who find themselves in hospital beds, or waiting anxiously beside those beds,
those
who gather to say farewell to one who is traveling, or one who is moving,
those
who gather at graveside to say that longer farewell,
those
who worry about where the next meal, or the next rent cheque, will come from,
those
who live in places where peace is just a word, a faint hope, a distant dream,
May
all those whose language is rent by pain hear you lamenting with them,
...time
of silence...
God
of Pentecost,
God
who speaks with many tongues,
God
who makes God-self known in many ways,
fill
us with Your Spirit this and every morning,
hear
the prayers we share using many different languages,
we
pray in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, the one we call Christ, whose life,
death
and resurrection show us the path to the Kingdom.
We
pray as people of the Spirit,
who
lights our fires, who fills our lungs with air,
who
blows us out into the world to live and serve.
Amen.
~ written by Rev. Gord Waldie and posted on Worship Offerings. http://worshipofferings.blogspot.ca/
