"O God, in whose eternal love do rest the spirits of all thy children..."
Rev. Dr. Brent A. Smith
All Souls Community Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan
August 3, 2008
O God, in whose eternal love do rest the spirits of all thy children, we praise and bless thy name for the great company of those who, having walked with us in this life, have gone before us into thy world of light.
For Thou hast encompassed us about with a mighty cloud of witnesses: thy saints and prophets, courageous men and heroic women, and little children, all those most dear, who speak within our hearts of hope and trust and love.
And especially do we give thanks for Greg McKendry and Linda Kraeger who witnessed in their lives for their trust in the breadth of Love and the wideness of Mercy, and gave their lives for that trust. Bless their names to thy continual keeping, and save their earthly lives within the eternity of thine own.
And watch over Joe Barnhart, Jack Barnhart, Betty Barnhart, Linda Chavez, John Worth, Jr., Tammy Sommers, and Allison Lee. Aid in the healing of their physical wounds inflicted when they stood up for Love and Mercy. And walk with those in our Knoxville Churches who have been traumatized by a heinous act. And especially, O God, walk with and bless the children. And walk with all those everywhere who find themselves the unwitting target for religious intolerance and hatred. And heal the spirit of the shooter, Jim Adkisson, from the malice and hatred of his soul’s sickness, which has taken from him the capacity to see your Divine Likeness in human beings and blinded him to the Love you have for all souls. It is the capacity to see these things and shape the world by them that makes us fully human.
O God, we do not presume to know thy children as thou knowest them. But, we do give thee thanks for all those secret, mysterious completions of life beyond our understanding but known by thee: the hidden service human beings render to one another in private; the petitions for thy support and comfort that are concealed in the recesses of the human heart; the cry of our souls in pain and in joy; and the benediction of thy peace which always comes at last.
Now may thy children, Greg McKendry and Linda Kraeger, rest in peace. May the people of the Knoxville Unitarian Universalist churches know that peace which passes all human understanding. For in the midst of walking in the valley of the shadow of death, their eyes have seen also a glory, and their hearts have known and given love, and the lives of all souls living and dead remain a blessing. AMEN
Copyright Rev. Brent Smith
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Last updated on Thursday, June 3, 2010.
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