Prayer & Praise

God of all truth, we give thanks for your faithful utterance of reality.

In your truthfulness, you have called the world “very good.”

In your truthfulness, you have promised, “I have loved you with an everlasting love.”

In your truthfulness, you have assured, “This is my beloved Son.”

In your truthfulness, you have voiced, “Fear not, I am with you.”

In your truthfulness, you have guaranteed that “Nothing shall separate us from your love in Jesus Christ.”

It is by your truthfulness that we love.

And yet, we live in a world phony down deep in which we participate at a slant.

Ours is a seduced world, where we call evil good and good evil,

where we put darkness for light and light for darkness,

where we call bitter sweet and sweet bitter (Isa. 5:20),

where we call war peace and peace war,

so that we rarely see the truth of the matter.

Give us courage to depart the pretend world of euphemism,

to call things by their right name,

to use things for their right use,

to love our neighbor as you love us.

Overwhelm our fearful need to distort, that we may fall back into your truth-telling about us, that we may be tellers of truth and practitioners of truth.

We pray in the name of the One whom you have filled with “grace and truth.”

Amen.
Walter Brueggemann. Awed to Heaven, Rooted in Earth: The Prayers of Walter Brueggemann (p. 129). Kindle Edition.