Covenanting God, Your people betrayed You
And exchanged their liberation for an idol.
Be close to all who experience profound betrayal;
who know what it means to trust and be let down,
to promise and be forgotten,
to sacrifice and be ignored,
to believe and be heartbroken.
Bless all who struggle with anger, bitterness,
and thoughts of revenge,
and those who wonder if they can ever trust again.
Yet You, O God, changed Your mind
and did not visit disaster on Your people.
Fill the hearts of all who are searching
for the grace to change their minds, to try again,
to hope, to live beyond their resentment,
and to trust their own judgment.
Give us grace to change our own minds,
to overcome our pride and hard-heartedness,
and to enter the freedom You promise us.
Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer.
You hear us calling,
You hear us calling,
Abba Father.
Liberating God, empower all Your children
who long for the freedom to vote,
to live without fear,
to break out from oppression,
to remake their societies as equals under the law.
Sustain those in Libya
who seek a new way of life.
Bless the people of Yemen and Syria
as they hope for peaceful transition of power.
Visit Your people in Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea
and other lands where violence is part of government control
and opposition incurs danger.
Strengthen those who work
for a healthy future for Iraq and Afghanistan.
Encourage all who experience life in our own country
as a life of disadvantage, fear, or slavery.
Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer.
You hear us calling,
You hear us calling,
Abba Father.
Loving God, You walk with us in the valley,
accompany us in the wilderness,
speak with us on the mountain,
and promise us flourishing life with You.
Be present to all who face serious illness.
Grant them hope, alleviate their pain,
help them to plan for their future,
and above all bring them friends.
Bless the work of hospital and hospice chaplains
and all who listen and enter the mystery of pain
with the sick and the dying.
In a moment of quiet we offer You
one person we know to be facing the reality
of the end of life ...
Fill their soul with healing balm
and still every faithless murmur.
Transforming God, You turn our weakness
into Your opportunity,
our sin into Your grace,
our pride into Your wisdom,
our folly into Your mercy,
our evil into Your goodness.
Turn the wounds of our sin
into the glory of Your resurrected body,
that we might live more truly,
love more deeply,
and follow more faithfully,
now and forever. Amen.
Lord have mercy,
Christ have mercy.
Lord have mercy,
Christ have mercy.