John 3:16 (pandemic)

I wrote this version in the midst of the pandemic, when Decatur First UMC was worshiping online. The same reading came back around in 2024 (thanks, Revised Common Lectionary!) so I revisited it for a new day here.

Creating and redeeming God, we come seeking your presence.  

Your word tells us that you love us, and that you love this world so much.  

You love it in all of its wonder and mystery, 

but you love it no less in the ordinary, repetition of our daily lives.  

We have seen robots zooming around on mars, and ancient meteors landing in driveways, and yet many of us cannot yet safely leave our homes, we are grateful that your love is both big and small.  It encompasses the enormity of the universe, and it fills the crevices of our normal lives, seamlessly merging us with you, and with this creation that you love so much.  

Like your love, our prayers are both big and small.  We pray for a swift end to this pandemic, and for restoration of our lives not so much back to what they were before, but to something more whole, more connected, and more intentional.  

We pray for kids and schools, teachers, and parents, we pray for their mental and emotional health, as well as their physical health and safety while moving back toward learning together in person.  We pray for the systems and policies that structure the education of children in our society, that they would be just and equitable, and that each child would be seen as a whole person, a brilliant soul, beloved by you and by us. 

We pray for those who do battle with the darkness every day - those struggling to stay sober, those managing depression and despair, those caught in abusive relationships, those whose previous experience in church leads them to believe that they do not deserve your love.  We reject every abuse of power, every thought, every implication that says your love is not for everyone, and we ask that you would empower us to bear that love to even the darkest places.  

We pray for those who are suffering and in pain.  So many of us are sick, receiving difficult treatments for cancer, and seeking hard-to-find answers to health related questions.  So many of us are grieving lost loved ones.  Wherever we are hurting, Lord, heal us.  Wherever we are broken, restore us.  And may the grief that we feel now grow warmer, less lonely, and more compassionate over time.  

We ask all of this in the name of Jesus, who came to save the world, and all of us, and who taught us to pray by saying, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.  Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our tresspasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.  For thine is the kingdom and the power and glory forever.  Amen.