For good reason, O God, our prayers often start close to home.
For those whom we know.
Those whom we love.
Those whose lives are intimately intertwined with our own.
A fraction of whose names we can say out loud.
Countless others fill and sometimes break our hearts.
We remember all of them now calling on that which we know of You and Your abiding presence and surrounding their lives with all the love and hope and strength and support we can muster. And so we pray, O God.
And pushing our lives and prayers further, we remember all those places into which Jesus rides today, not with grand procession and triumphant shouts, but often unnoticed or unnamed, but present still.
Damascus.
Gaza.
Barcelona.
Dusseldorf.
Damasak.
Tikrit.
If only they knew those things that make for peace, O God.
If only we knew those things, O God.
And so we pray.
Not alone, but together as Your people gathered in this place.
For health.
For hope.
For comfort.
For peace.
Amen.