Blog Archives - ST. PETER'S CHELSEA

A Prayer of Lament by Lisha Epperson

9/27/2020

O God, we acknowledge our failure and bow our hearts in sadness. We have not stewarded your love and mercy. We have not reflected your compassion. We have not responded to your spirit. We have turned our back on truth and have strayed from the sacred path. We are divided and this should not be. Forgive us. Lord in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.

We remember the painful history of hate crimes embedded in the fabric of American life. We remember Breonna Taylor, her family and community, along with the many people of color that fall victim to police brutality. We are grieved by the systems that continue to fail people of color ... the chronic disease … of racism. We stand in the place of no words and lament this injustice. We must ... we will do better. Lord in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.

We remember the loss of over 200,000 lives to Covid-19. We lift up the communities that have been hardest hit and lament the realities that leave so many, so vulnerable. This pandemic has lain bare, the painful truth of systemic economic injustice. We lament the ways we’ve allowed this to happen. We lament these gross inequalities. Lord in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.

We trust you, O God. Renew within us, the image of your beloved son Jesus, that we may know your will. Give us courage to do what is right and persistence in challenging unjust structures and institutions. Grace us we pray, with strength and resilience to do this work, ever mindful of your dream of beloved community - your people united. We can’t do it without you. Lord in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.

We believe lament is the work of reconciliation and know this effort as an investment in our freedom. Lord help us in our desire, help us in our desire to truly be free. And with a cry for equal parts justice, hope and healing for all, we seal this prayer with a hearty amen and ask for your grace. Lord, in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.

Most holy God, who rules and reigns above all, who with loving care and divine purpose called this world, and each of us into being. Help us to discern the time in which we live, and hear clearly - your urgent message of life-giving, liberating love. Empower us to share it, in our communities and among nations. Help us to live the truth of your peace - through the love of your Son, our savior Jesus Christ, who with you and the Holy Spirit nudge us in hope, ever forward. Amen.

Friday's Email: When There are No (English) Words

9/25/2020

In the Korean language, there is a word - han. I remember years ago my parents trying to explain what it meant. “There is no English translation for han,” my father said. I watched him struggle with the words in trying to describe it. “It is … deepest sorrow, grief, bitterness, anger, longing… all rolled into one.”

I was in Zoom calls all day yesterday, some of which I had to lead, and I could feel myself pushing it down, trying to hold it together, this pervasive feeling of… han. And I fear that if I stop long enough to let myself feel it, let it wash over me, I may not be able to pull myself back together again.

And yet, being people of the Book, we know that han, while not called that in Scripture, is all over the place. “How long, O Lord?” is a refrain that the psalmists and the prophets cried out again and again. We see Jesus turning over tables in anger and sweating drops of blood in the garden saying, “My soul is sorrowful unto death.”
Anger and grief do not separate us from God. They draw us closer and deeper into the very depths of God's being. It is the prayer of lament. We lament because we are made in the image of God. We lament because we love. We lament because we know, this is not the way it's supposed to be.

There is a season for everything, the writer of Ecclesiastes says. Lament is not the only thing we do. There is a time to act. This is where I am this morning and that is the place from which I write. I pray that wherever you are this morning, that you would sense God's invitation to bring whatever you are carrying into the depths of God's being and know, he receives and holds it all.

- Christine