Pastoral Prayer for December 31, 2023

Our pastoral prayer this morning comes from Ted Loder.

Please allow the words of his prayer to become your own personal words.

Patient God,

     I ask you to gather me,

          for I realize the storms of time

               have scattered me,

                    the furies of the year past have driven me,

                         many sorrows have scarred me,

                              much activity has wearied me,

                                   and fear has spooked me

                                         into a hundred hiding places.

I am sick of a string of “have-a-nice-day’s.”

What I want is

     passionate days,

          challenging days,

               blessed days,

                    surprising days.

What I want is you!

Patient God,

     help me not to let my life slip away from me.

O God, I hold up my life to you now,

     as much as I can,

          as high as I can,

               in this mysterious reach called prayer.

Come close, lest I wobble and fall short.

It is not days or years I seek from you,

     not infinity and enormity,

          but small things and moments and awareness,

               awareness that you are in what I am

                     and in what I have been indifferent to.

It is not new time,

     but new eyes,

          new heart I seek,

               and you.

Patient God,

     grant me moments

           when broken things get mended

                 with glue or guts or mercy or imagination.

O Patient God,

make something new in me,

     in this year,

          for you.

Amen.