Once again we personally have been spared the fury of a climate which seems to have gone mad, while thousands of others lost their homes, and still others their lives. In the midst of the enormous questions which confront us, we gather in praise of the God of creation. He may not answer all those questions, but He consoles and comforts us and those who currently are far more profoundly affected by life’s questions that we are. Therefore let us worship the God who seeks us, even as we seek Him.
Pastoral Prayer
We praise Thee, Lord God, that in a world which might otherwise be characterized by complete chaos or total environmental destruction, there is yet so much peaceful and fruitful order in the world. When we contemplate the totality of the planet on which Thou hast placed us, we are amazed by how intricately and smoothly it operates most of the time. How great Thou art, O God; how great Thou art!
But at a time such as this we are also reminded of how fragile natural laws appear, as another major hurricane came ashore nor far from us, while missing us altogether. We pray for the thousands of people who have lost their homes or had major damage to their property, and for the families of those who loved ones in the ferocity of the winds. Move among us to become stewards who share our wealth with them in their time of great loss. We pray also for all those people around the world, but especially in America, who deny the disastrous and growing evidence of climate change. Help those of us who recognize it also better to understand the political, economic, and financial rationale behind the denial of the deniers. Most of us strongly believe what we choose to believe. Move us also to believe in and to continue to love those with whom we strongly disagree.
We ask that Thou wouldst grant solace and comfort to those whose lives are constantly plagued by fears. Bless those who fear large things and small things, real threats and imagined threats, actual enemies and potential enemies. May Thy grace conquer their fears, and may each of us become agents of that grace. These things we ask in the name of Jesus, who exhibited a life filled with grace, until graceless men ended his life. May his example to us become our example to others. Now we pray together as Jesus taught his original disciples, saying, Our Father….