❤️🔥 The Most Durable Power in the World
Sorrow and despair are born at night, but morning always follows.
In the depths of despair, where do we find kindling to reignite the fire within us?
School was canceled today. It feels like -28 degrees, my weather app tells me as I take a break from reading chilling headline after chilling headline. I sit under a thick blanket near the fire, thinking about doing the work that is ours to do. My kids laugh and play around me, and I wonder about the world they’re inheriting. Yesterday, we had the day off to honor the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and recommit to remembering that our labor toward a more peaceable kingdom is not in vain.
I wrote the following prayer in 2020. You can find it on pages 141-143 of To Light Their Way.
May the words below spark hope when the cold wind blows.
Borrow this Prayer
O Lord, through Dr. King, You taught us, and are still teaching us, what it is to stand with our oppressed brothers and sisters. For whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. Lord, we thank You for Dr. King’s leadership against the scourge of racism and for the ways his nonviolent teachings reverberate through our hearts today.
We lament the ways we have taken his quotes out of context and ignored the greater picture of his mission and ministry of social change. We walk in the paths Dr. King cleared out for us, and yet we know many weeds still need to be pulled. Help us yank the violence of racism by the root from our hearts and our systems. He had a dream for his children, Lord, and we lament the ways the dream is yet to be fulfilled.
Help us teach our children about Dr. King as a man whose work was propelled by his love for You, Lord. And help our children know that this work is not over. May our children know the cost of speaking out for justice and mercy—friends, status, even nights in jail—because being obedient to Your Spirit may scare the powerful.
Lord, help our kids know that speaking up against racism and working for justice may cost them lots of somethings, but it will never cost their souls. If the moral arc of the universe is bent toward justice, may You ignite in our children flexibility and prophetic imagination to see Your Kingdom come.
May it be so, that our earth reflects how it is in heaven.
Lord, the fight against racism starts at home. Help our family live in mutuality, knowing that the good of all—Black, indigenous, people of color—is tied up in our well-being. That nobody is free until we all are free.
May we honor the work of Dr. King and countless other women and men fighting for civil rights, yesterday and today, by not shying away from the contact burns it takes to keep the fires of freedom burning in our hearts.
For many, many tomorrows, Lord, we pray that our parenting and the nonviolent choices our family makes with our speech, our money, our votes would honor our neighbor.
Protect us, Lord, from the lure of traps, what Dr. King warned of—spiritual doom.
Help us remember dawn will come. As Dr. King reminded us from the psalmist, sorrow and despair are born at night, but morning always follows.
Let us not lose hope.
Help us do what we can with the tools we have to cultivate paths of peace and righteousness.
We honor the committed, courageous work of not only MLK but the advocates and activists working tirelessly today for a more just world for all people in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Let justice roll down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream. May we live as parents and children who enter this work with You with urgency and sustenance from the Living Water, from a well that won’t run dry.
O Lord, as we honor this day, the day of Dr. King’s birth, we lament that this nonviolent minister was murdered as he lived out a gospel of love.
May we remember and not forget that our actions as colaborers with Christ, rooted in love, will be a threat to those who want to do it the old way, who love power and money over justice and humanity.
When given the choice, may our children know to choose community.
May they choose the love of neighbor that flows out of the love of God—a love that overcomes. A love that, as Dr. King said, is the most durable power in the world.
May It Be So
Praying and working alongside you,
Every Season Sacred | To Light Their Way | @liturgiesforparents
Beautiful words and an encouraging reminder. Thank you, Kayla!