When we are sitting around our tables for our Thanksgiving gatherings and feeling grateful for the many blessings we enjoy every day, the conflict and despair in the Middle East seems far away. We feel safe and content and happy to be with family and friends. The turkey both smells and tastes so good. We eat and are satisfied and feel safe and warm and loved. News reports from the Middle East remind us that circumstances are very different for people there. At least 900 people have died in Israel and more than 680 Palestinians have been killed since the conflict broke out on Saturday when there was a devastating surprise attack on Israel. The history of this conflict is long and painful. Whether we think of nations at war or individuals and families who are committed to destroying each other, the outcomes are exceedingly tragic. Whenever people choose a path of hate instead of a path of love, there is destruction and anguish. Any political dispute is complicated. Any broken relationship has the perspectives of both sides of the severed commitment to each other. When there has been hurt and injustice, the desire for revenge is strong. How can we pray for God’s intervention in the circumstances that are humanly impossible to resolve? Our incapacity to understand and to know what in the world to do, draws us to recognize our deep and compelling need for God. Recall the words of Jesus, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” There have been repeated attempts at negotiating peace in the Middle East. There are those whose work is to counsel and meet with individuals in an attempt to bring some kind of reconciliation. We are reminded that what the world gives is not adequate. This week we will pray for the peace that only comes through Jesus. This is a peace we can all seek in every relationship. Please plan to pause wherever you are for our WEDNESDAY PRAYER TOGETHER tomorrow October 11th at 1 pm.
Praying that we will pray for the peace of Christ and live the peace of Christ in our world, Pastor Lola
Our loving God of mercy, please have mercy on our troubled world. Attacks and retaliation perpetuate the death and despair and blinding hatred. Oh God, as human beings, we cannot see a way forward when we look at the circumstances in Israel and Palestine. We want to imagine a very different picture, but then we hear the missiles exploding and the people crying and we know that the peace that the world would attempt to broker is sadly inadequate. We come to You today praying for the peace and reconciliation that can only come through Your Son Jesus. Please enlighten minds and hearts to admit that human attempts at peace are not sufficient. Our God we wonder how in small and persistent ways peace could permeate the hearts of hatred. We pray that people in the Middle East and we ourselves will be given eyes of understanding and compassion. Allow us the grace to admit the hurts we have caused to others. Only as You God break down walls of longstanding hostility, can there be hope for glimmers of understanding. We think of those who have lost hope that there can ever be peace in the Middle East or in their own hearts. We turn to You as the only hope we have for peace. Like a gentle trickle, we pray that a stream of peace can cross the desert of despair and begin to quench the parched and hardened ground. We do not pretend to comprehend all the details of what has led to this bitter conflict in the Middle East. Please increase this gentle trickle of a stream of peace to a river that gathers momentum as it rushes forward. Our God we are asking You to counteract the hate of this situation with Your love. For those who wake up in the morning and plot further attacks and killing, we pray that You will change their whole mindset. Even as we pray with longing for peace in the Middle East, we know that temporary measures still find the hatred simmering just below the surface. This really does require a Divine work of healing. Please God bring the peace of Christ to every thought and motive. Break the weapons of war and replace them with the means to work together for peace. We are asking that the peace of our Lord Jesus will inhabit us in every way and influence those around us. And may the lasting peace of Jesus move from person to person to extend around our whole world. You are our only hope for peace and we commit ourselves to wage peace in our troubled world. In the Name of Jesus, the Giver of Peace, AMEN.