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324 - Contextual Prayer |
Contextual Prayer
By Vic Jameson
For Those Who Drink
God,
You made the grape and the grain, and sent the rain to make them flourish. We sinful mortals have ofttimes converted these good harvests into raisins and branflakes; we confess these abominations. And even when we have put them to rightful uses we have on occasions drunk too deeply, but you know that we also have repented painfully.
Deliver us from misuse or abuse, and make us remember the day when you will put a new wine into even these old and jaundiced skins.
Amen.
For Those Who Write
God,
You called some to be teachers, and some preachers, and some to be deacons, and drawers of water, and hewers of wood; and some who were fit for none of these worthy occupations you called to be writers of words.
We ask your grace upon such as these.
Help them, God, to get their stories factual and straight. Guide their fumbling fingers on the typewriter keys, and for whatever good it may do, strengthen the connections between their fingers and their minds.
And such hearts as they have, bid them use same freely, that their printer's ink might evoke the flowing not of blood but of fellowship.
Give them a good story now and then, to keep their editors civil, their readers happy, and their minds off their own degradation.
And when the day comes for their final thirty-dashes, mercifully grant them just a glimpse of your glory before they travel to that eternity to which they have been consigned so frequently by so many, and which they no doubt so richly deserve.
Amen.
Vic Jameson is a layman and Associate Director of the Presbyterian Office of Information of the United Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. These prayers, as he explains, attempt to reflect "as I understand all prayers reflect a craving to express thought and feeling to God. I hope they do not seem flippant; they were not so intended. Looking back over them reminds me that the prayers seem to have been written at General Assemblies. Those who have worked at such gatherings will understand why."
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325 - Contextual Prayer |
For Those Who Prepare Statements
God,
You have spoken to us through prophets and parables, through the beauty of your creation and even through the ugliness we have made of it. We thank you for all you have said, though the clamor of our own voices has grievously kept us from having ears to hear or eyes to see.
Forgive our futile words and fallible causes; the pomposity with which we dare to speak on your behalf and the sloth that allows us to substitute words for deeds.
Make us more than speakers, but also hearers and interpreters and doers of your word, so that we may become faithful servants of him who was and is the first and final Word for us all.
Amen.
God,
You created the universe and all that is in it without help, and we praise you that your good creation was accomplished without calling together a committee.
But being sinful and fallible men, we have organized ourselves into committees and commissions, and have compounded our folly with task forces and work groups. Our calendars are stained and our wits strained with our own futility.
In your mercy overlook our inability to decide or act unless we can share the blame. Lead us by that light that comes not from smoke-filled rooms, and finally to that table around which we may gather as a committee of your whole people, where agendas are replaced by your Fatherhood and dockets made unnecessary by the presence of your love.
Amen.