The Prayer

Holy Unnamable One, Wholly Unknowable One,
Again we have read the story. Again we have sung the tale. Again we wonder at our place in it. Is it ours to tell? How can it beours to live?
Move in our hearts, we pray, that when the voices of angels, the sigh of winter wind, the sounding of bell or harp or children’s song bear Your messages into the world, we might hear and heed and believe.
Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.
Each of us, a favored one. Life is with us—the folks next door, drivers, farmers, moms and dads, teachers, aunts and uncles and cousins, bankers, chefs, students, healers, handymen, retirees and volunteers. Plant in us belief.
Fear not!
Though strange happenings unfold. Though death is real. Though war ravages nations and rends hearts and families. Though tyrants reign. Though injustice seems omnipresent and intractable. Though our very earth ails. Fear not, the final act has not yet been played. Tend in us belief.
For see, I am bringing glad tidings of great joy.
The final act is even now being written anew. Courageous souls disrupt complacency in the service of justice. Awareness flares and swells. Hearts break open. The people learn another way and tend the earth and one another with loving care. Spark in us belief.
Unto you…
Even unto us—broken, sinful, crabby, uncertain us. Even unto us—prideful, angry, self-satisfied us. Even unto us—privileged, struggling, lost us. Even unto us—making it through, doing our best, more blessed than most us. Fan in us belief.
Is born this day...
Not long ago and far away. Not once upon a time, remembered, storied but no longer. Not in distant days to come. This day—this 21st century day, in December, in [Minnesota]. This day—on which we have woken one more time, to live the lives given us and grow in love and bless the world with our being. Awaken in us belief.
A Savior.
Each child born a savior. Each of us reborn a savior. Knowing not how or when or why we will save the world, yet born each day to do so in some way possible only through our life. Stir in us belief.
And so, may we ourselves become the voice of angels, the sigh of the winter’s wind, the sounding of bell or harp or children’s song, proclaiming now and forever, Your message to all lands and all peoples:
“Peace on Earth!”
Amen.