Praying about Gun Violence

Lord,

Our nation is enduring the

effects of another tragic killing.

I am neither hot nor cold.

I am frozen in place,

trying to figure out

how to navigate this brutal season.

I cry out as Habakkuk did.

“How long, O Lord! I cry for help

but you do not listen!

I cry out ‘Violence!’

but you do not intervene.”

Lord,

I know that you call me to compassion.

You call me to forgiveness.

Why must you call me to love

people who do not act lovingly?

It is such hard work.

Jesus modeled it for us,

but you may have noticed that

I’m not Jesus…

just a human being.

Yet that is the hard work

that I am called to do.

I have wrestled with this, Lord.

How to follow your will

when I have conflicting emotions,

and opinions…

about the person who died

and the person who did the killing.

I know you understand

my need to wrestle with this.

I also know that my only recourse is to you, Lord

because I do not know how to

work this out under my own power.

I can only work this out under your power.

Your wish is that we be the light,

we be examples of your compassion.

Guide me in this particular moment.

I lay before you:

The weight of all that I am feeling.

The hardness of what I am feeling.

The dissonance and despair that I am feeling.

Help me seek compassion.

Help me seek forgiveness.

It is so hard Lord,

But you have called us to do hard things.

Help me when inappropriate opinions flair up.

Help me when vengeful emotions and options

press against what you would have me do.

Help me love as you love.

AMEN