FCCR-ACE Prayer Blog

Congregationalists Learning to Pray

Hi God,

We come … and we go.
That seems the inevitable way of things.
Today I remembered
it was the 15th anniversary
of my Dad’s passing.
Then, this evening, I learn
that your servant Alan,
our former pastor,
has joined my Dad.

I hope Dad and Alan meet
and get to swap some “larry” stories,
and sing some songs together.
I hope Alan and Dad also get to hang out
with my friend Luther,
who was quite the singer,
Hazel’s (and thus my) Aunt Bevie and Uncle Stu,
and those of my dogs
who are no longer with us,
Bridget, Colleen, Scotty and Cider Anne
(also Lord Russel, my grad-school cat).
I think they would all
have rather a jolly time together.

I guess that’s my view of heaven:
you hang out with loved ones,
you sing together,
and your dogs are all there,
playing joyfully together.
I hope you don’t mind this simple vision;
the one in Revelation seems overly strange.

I would also ask you to please
have mercy on all our souls,
those of us who are still in earth,
and those of us who have passed on,
sinners though we are
or once were.

Amen

Hi God,

Not surprisingly, I’m thinking about health care.
I’m thinking about it because one of us
had a “procedure” today.
I’m also thinking about it
because half the country seems
little inclined to see that everyone
receives adequate health care.
“Hey, we can’t afford it”.
Why is that, exactly?
Isn’t “cost” often a decision about
who gets to be rich and who not?

Please explain to me where “cost”
is an issue in the story in Matthew 25?
You know the part that says,

“35
For I was hungry and you gave me food,
I was thirsty and you gave me drink,
a stranger and you welcomed me,
36
naked and you clothed me,
ill and you cared for me,
in prison and you visited me.”

My Bible is missing the part that says,

“40
… Amen, I say to you,
whatever you did [when you felt you could afford it]
for one of these least brothers of mine,
you did for me.”

The part in brackets there,
[when you felt you could afford it].
It’s not in my Bible.
But it’s in the one being read by many of us.
Why is that?
Why do we have different versions?

So my prayer today
is that you find a way to clarify your message to us dummies.
That you pour your Holy Spirit into us
and change our hearts.
That we eschew peripheral things
and focus on what you’ve been trying
to tell us for several millenia,
but which we seem to keep not getting.
Help us get it…eventually.
We only have a few years here.
Also, please have mercy on all our souls
sinners though we obviously be.

Amen

Hi God,

I was supposed to do a prayer yesterday,
but it’s already today, so that won’t happen.
How ‘bout I write a prayer
about yesterday?
I can say what I’d have said
were I at a computer yesterday.
Some things I did, in fact say,
things directed your way,
albeit not in digital form.

So it’s July, my favorite month.
I like July because it’s usually hot
—unlike some we might mention, I like hot—
and also because I was born in July.
Earlier this past week I reached a milestone, so to speak.
I went from being 111111 to being 1000000.
In other words, I’m a million,
at least in binary.
Thank you for all those years.

Ah…but yesterday,
yesterday was pure July,
the July that makes me love it so.
We went on a mission of mercy, so to speak,
up to my in-laws.
It seems that their raspberries
are crying out to be picked.
My in laws are getting a bit infirm
and can’t pick so easily themselves.
My mother-in-law gets cranky if the berries go unpicked.
I’m not sure the berries care, but she surely does.

Anyway, we went and met up with
our sister (in-law) and niece.
I had the most blessed time,
under the hot sun,
in among the brambles,
chatting occasionally with Hazel, Sue and ‘Becca;
picking berries; dropping them in a pail.
Sometimes dropping them on the ground.
That made me think about Boaz and Ruth.
One is supposed to leave some of the harvest
behind for the gleaners.
I don’t know who gleans berry patches,
but probably some little furry critters crawl in
looking for a feast.
So glad to have been of help.

And now we also have a feast.
My mother-in-law needs the berries to be picked
but doesn’t actually need the berries herself.
She sent almost all of them home with us
and with our co-pickers, Sue and ‘Becca.
Some 16 quarts in all, I believe.

So my prayer today is to thank you for July,
for berries and for family with whom to share
little tasks and little treats.
Also to thank you for giving me
the opportunity, from time to time,
to notice explicitly
how truly blessed I am.

Also, please do have mercy on my soul,
sinner though I be.

Amen.

Dear God help me to appreciate the coolness of the beginning of this summer…Help me not to get crabby because the clouds and rain seem never ending…I know that the sun will shine and the heat will come on..

dear god keep the campers and their counselors safe and dry and help them to have the best experience getting to know themselves and each other and you god…

dear god bless the Iraqis as we pull out of their cities and leave them to provide greater and greater security for their people.

dear god bless those folks who travel to do mission that they can show us how we might also do mission closer to home…

dear god bless the newlyweds whether they be same gender or not that they might truly become one soul regardless.. .

Dear god thank you for continued employment.. .

Amen

Dear god thank you for the relationship my sons share withtheir grandmother it enriches all who witness it.
double amen

.,._

Hi God,

I’m like a blank page today.
Generally, I blather away at all times
and drive poor Hazel and Brewster crazy.
Today, I’m not sure I have much to say.
Later on today, I’ll have much going on,
preparing to pick up my brother at the airport
and also preparing to feed his wife and him.
She fancies herself a gourmet cook.
I hope baked chicken and mashed potatoes will suffice.
Does it matter? I doubt it.

So my prayer today is that we learn
to be grateful for simple things
as well as the grand things.
Sometimes the baked chicken and mashed potatoes of life
can be as good and beneficial as the cordon bleu of life.
Help me, help us all, learn to accept blessings, both great and small
with grateful hearts.

Also, please have mercy on my sinner’s soul.

Amen