CHRISTMAS PRAYER
As
I write this, it is the day after Christmas 2024; a day and a half after
celebrating Christmas Eve, celebrating the birth of Jesus, lighting candles,
singing “Silent Night Holy Night” as we lift candles into the air. I wanted to
wish everyone a Merry Christmas, so I spent some time this morning googling
John Wesley Christmas prayer, which resulted in a lot of results about his Covenant
Prayer (which we’ll look at next week). But I found a prayer from
johnwesleyumc.org for 2017 and I wanted to shared a few lines from it
As
a deacon in the United Methodist Church, ordained to Word, Service, Compassion
and Justice, the following lines resonated with me, especially because I think
it calls me and all of us to do something:
“And
we pray, too for our country and our world, and for those working to maintain
peace in the world. We pray for an end
to the violence and incivility that seems to run rampant these days across all
sectors of society. Lord, we know that
you too are saddened when you see the innocent suffering, the lack of love for
one another.
We
are made in your image God, and yet we have often distorted that image with our
self-serving ways, our lack of compassion, and our refusal to look out for the
needs of others. Many have taken your
good gift of free will and used it to gain power, control, position. And so we pray for change, we pray that you
would us to bring understanding and tolerance and peace, remembering that you,
God are greater than anyone or anything, and truly “goodness is stronger than
evil; love is stronger than hate.”
Lord,
as our gift to you tonight, we offer ourselves.
May this be a time for us of renewed commitment to living the path
Christ taught us… love, forgiveness, reconciliation, peace, patience and joy.”[1]
This
prayer definitely resonated with me as I read what’s going on around us, and
then it struck me…this was written at the end of 2017, seven years ago, and it
still “fits”. I’m not sure I want this to “fit” anymore. So what do I do? What do
we do? What do you do?
As
we spend this time between Christmas and Epiphany, celebrating the birth of Jesus,
let us commit to working toward doing what means this doesn’t fit anymore. Let
us pray…
Feel free to contact me at sranousacctg@twcny.rr.com or
susanranous@unyumc.org
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