Prayers for Venezuela

Hunger, inflation and economic collapse run through the prayers gathered for Venezuela, along with protest, contested elections, and the millions who have left in search of work and safety. Drought and regional tension appear here too, as do the quiet efforts made toward negotiation and return.

Lead Us From Darkness to Light: A Prayer for Peace 72 Years After Hiroshima and Nagasaki (August 10, 2017)

Dear God Today we pray for peace. We remember those who perished with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan 72 years ago this week. The monuments and memorials and parks in these cities and other cities and lands having suffered holocausts remind us that our prayers are mighty and necessary. Help us to […]

There Is a Balm in Gilead: Prayers for Those Jailed for Speaking Out, Firefighters, and Elephants (August 3, 2017)

The Lord upholds all who are falling, and raises up all who are bowed down. Psalm 145:14 There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole; There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul. God of grace and glory, God who knows our hearts and minds, you can see, you […]

Sighs Too Deep for Words: Prayers for a World of Fires, Floods, Famine, and War (July 27, 2017)

The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple…. My eyes shed streams of tears because your law is not kept. Ps 119: 130, 136 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs […]

Worth More Than Sparrows: Prayers for Portugal’s Wildfires, Storm Cindy, and Yemen’s Cholera (June 22, 2017)

Lord, I can see the cherries ripening on the tree outside. The raspberries redden almost quicker than I can pick, but there are those for whom there will be no harvest. As sparrows happily investigate the fruit, they remind me, everyone is of more value than sparrows. Deep down we really know this, however […]

Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled: Prayers for Iran’s Mine Disaster and Shipwrecks off Libya (May 11, 2017)

[Jesus said to the disciples,] “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I […]

Amen, May It Be So: Prayers for Venezuela’s Protests and Arkansas Executions (April 27, 2017)

Amen. Yes. So be it. It will certainly be like this. May it be so. This is the truth. On this we can depend. Amen! Compassionate and loving God, as we watch events unfold across our world, our emotions often cannot be translated into words. So we call out to You with a word You […]

Who Is My Neighbor: Prayers for Standing Rock, the Kabul Bombing, and Louisiana Tornadoes (February 9, 2017)

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself. -Luke 10:27 “it is written in the law.” heart & soul. love. neighbor. even if they aren’t nice. another chance to hear that answer. […]

Guide Us in Truth and Love: Prayers for Mosul, Standing Rock, and a Divided America (December 28, 2016)

On Sunday after Sunday in our worship we sing: Worthy is Christ, the Lamb who was slain, Whose blood set us free to be people of God. Power and riches, wisdom and strength, And honor and blessing and glory are his. And with these words in mind this day, we pray […]

Pray Without Ceasing: Prayers for Aleppo, the Dalit Marches in India, and Calais (December 28, 2016)

Pray without ceasing…Becoming more infused with the nature and Spirit of God as we pray… Taking on the attributes of God as we become one with him beyond our earthly limits of time and space… Lord as Jacob (Israel) struggled and demanded a blessing from his opponent at Peniel, may we persist and demand your gifts […]

Teach Us to Listen: A Prayer After the Attack in Nice and a Week of Violence (July 14, 2016)

There is a terrifying passage in ‘I and Thou’ by the Jewish mystic Martin Buber in which God says ‘I have sunk my hearing in the deafness of mortals’. If this should be even partly true what a tremendous responsibility it places upon us to listen, to listen to each other with our whole attention, […]