Prayers for the Week of December 21, 2025

Photo credit: Daniel Schwarz, used with permission via Unsplash

Please feel free to join us in the prayers prayed in worship, Sunday, December 21:

Loving Christ, Emmanuel, God with us,

you come to us in this season and every season,

with healing, and justice, and peace.

You enter into the fullness of human experience,

all the suffering, all the joy, all the longing,

you are with us in every bit of life, even unto death,

and even then, bringing us into more life.

We give you thanks and praise.

Help us, with Joseph,

to choose human decency in every moment of every day.

Help us choose to act for the well-being of the vulnerable.

Help us choose to be loving and kind.

Help us, with Mary,

to stand up to the powers

and dismantle every system that hurts and harms.

Help us to lift up the lowly,

and fill the hungry with good things.

Teach us to be brave and kind.

Show us the fullness of the humanity we have in you.

We pray for peace wherever there is violence and  war.

We pray for a just world,

where every child has enough to live and thrive.

We pray healing for the Earth we have damaged,

and for every bit of creation that calls your good Earth home.

For those who are hungry, we pray for food enough and more.

For those who are unhoused, and for those on the move,

we pray for safe shelter and a place to call home.

For those who are ailing, we pray for healing.

For those who grieve, comfort.

For those who are lonely, companionship.

Trusting in your loving will for this world,

we bring the longing of our hearts,

knowing that our every longing

is met in your love for us in Jesus Christ.

We pray all this, joining our voices with the voices

of those around the world, and down through the generations,

who have ever called on you,

praying with them, the prayer that Jesus taught:

Our Father/Mother, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.