     Following is a prayer that I need to pray again and again and I am passing it along on the off chance that you will want to pray it yourselves now and then — in the hope that you might find it helpful just as I do.
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Be Part of the Solution
Not the Problem
Amid the million words that bombard us day after day,
on television, online, on Facebook, on the radio,
on our phones, on the streets,
on the job –
                                        especially
                   the thoughtless words,
the shallow words,
the hateful words,
help us, O Lord, to be silent and listen for your word,
the word you speak into our fear and anger
and confusion,
the word you speak to this terror-plagued,
shipwreck of a world
and to our troubled, deeply divided
                        land,
the word that is our only true hope.
                                                                                    Help us
to quiet our hearts,
close our mouths,
                                                                              and keep our fingers off keypads
                   long enough
           to hear your word calling us                        Â
not to be afraid,
to trust that you are with us,
to cool our angers,
and start being part of the solution
and stop
being part of the problem,
O Lord, help us to be the people you call your people to be,
people of courage and compassion,
people of faith and love,
people of hope;
people who are like a light that shows the way
through the darkness of a culture
in which self-serving, self-absorption, and
bigotry
still rule the day;
people whose thoughts and opinions are
shaped more by the Gospel
than personal political beliefs;
people whose actions are guided by the Christ
who gave himself for others,
loved the un-loveable,
and showed compassion
to the poor and outcast and hurting;
people
whose words
seek to build up, not tear down,
reconcile, not rend apart,
heal, not divide.
O Lord, help us to be such people!
To live with better belief
than many in our culture and
many Christians do;
to act better
than many in our culture and
many Christians act;
to speak better words
than many in our culture and
many Christians speak;
to recognize that we are not helpless, and
to realize that we can
make a difference not only
with our actions
but also
by the words we speak
if
the words we speak to others day after day
online, on Facebook, in texts and tweets,
at the office, in the neighborhood,
wherever we may be,
are words
that reflect the word you speak to us
in Christ our Lord.
Amen.
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