Prayer for jobs

We pray God for those who are looking for jobs and those who are finding it difficult to hold on to the job that they have. Guide those who are looking for a job to get one which will make use of their ability and qualification. Strengthen those with a job to learn the trade and perform well. We submit everyone to your care so that people struggling to find a job may not get desperate and find it difficult to face people. Jesus, we pray specially for those who move jobs or find their calling in something different from what others do. May new jobs be created and may new opportunities arise because of creative thinking and alternative ideas. We pray Jesus for job creating industries and communities which identify their responsibility of feeding families. May churches use their spaces to offer accommodation to young people searching for jobs and use their elaborate network to help in job searching and finding. We pray Holy Spirit for courage, inspiration and positive thinking for young and middle aged people so that they continue knocking on doors till one opens. May your church merciful God teach about the dignity of labour so that every job is one which has respect and dignity. May your doors of grace dear Lord open for your people. Amen.

Prayer of thanksgiving

This morning dear Lord we thank you for small and big things. Help us we ask and pray to make us identify all that you have done in our lives. You chose to create us, gave us the opportunity to live fully and unconditionally and gave us the earth and all in it so that we could be care takers and responsible people. Every day our list of wants grows like a never ending shopping list but we forget that there is a bigger and longer list which includes all that you have done in our lives. Help us to be thankful Lord for what we have even as we are already looking to the other things that you have graciously opened for our view and use. We pray God that we may be satisfied and feel peaceful about what we have instead of feeling grumpy and irritated about what we don’t have.

We realize this day O lord that if you could create someone so insignificant as us that you will have all that we will ever need in store for us. We do have deadlines to meet but we just cannot go from one deadline to another without stopping and taking time to breathe and be thankful for every step that has been made possible by your merciful care. How much can we thank you God for all that you are to us every single minute of our life? We today turn our gaze to you and thank you with all our heart, mind and soul knowing that you are listening, not expecting to be praised but feeling happy that we are bowing ourselves before you and setting free all that binds us under evil and unnecessary bondage. We thank you God, from deep within, and whatever happens today and in the days to come, that is not going to change. We thank you God for this moment and the numerous moments that have been possible by your sacrifice on the cross for us. We thank you God for loving us first and for setting the tone of how to love in our lives. Thank you Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Prayer after Sunday worship

Thank you God for another Sunday where we worshipped you, and received energy and strength for our body and soul. We are grateful for having a father or a father figure in our life who helped in significant ways. Thank you for the opportunity to come to your presence every Sunday. We stray and we sin in various ways and yet you ungrudgingly take us back and give us gifts like the father gave the prodigal son who came back to him. God, you have been gracious to us and that itself is a chance for us to become better people. As we sleep for energy to start a week, you Father God have given us the memory to sleep assured that we will wake up to see your smiling face and your pleasant ways . Thank you Father, son and Holy Spirit, one God in love. Amen.

Preparatory prayer for a Sunday

Our God who is worthy of worship, we pray for good thoughts and preparation for a Sunday which will help us pray, sing, hear the gospel, listen to sermons and worship in spirit and truth. May we reconcile with one another before approaching the Holy altar to partake of the body and blood of Christ. May we have communion knowing that communion nudges us ever so lovingly to serve each other and forgive each other and seek forgiveness from one another.

Gracious God, each one of us is undergoing some pain. Someone hasn’t got married, someone doesn’t have a child, someone else is seeking admission to a course, another one is struggling to study well, many are looking for jobs, others are struggling to hold on to theirs, so many don’t have food, others don’t have shelter, so many homes don’t have peace and others don’t have resources, plenty are struggling for medicines and care, others are fighting death, people we know are struggling with loneliness and depression, children are finding it difficult to cope with the pressure to do well, parents are thinking about what next for their child, a community is thinking of building a church, other church members are trying their best to hold on to what they have.

There are so many needs and yet we know for sure that you are a God who can assure us that all our needs will be fulfilled. Help us to be powered and inspired by your presence in us Jesus, and to be workers and helpers in your kingdom so that no one may starve, no one may hurt, no one may feel lonely and no one may be killed. Fill us with deep, sincere and good thoughts this night and early morning. May tomorrow be ours in hope and prayer. In your worshipful name dear God we pray. Amen.

Valentine’s day : A spiritual explanation of a popular celebration

Valentine’s day has over the years become a celebration used to sell cards, flowers and goodies meant for couples to exchange. Many shops convert entire floors into Valentine’s themes with red being the dominant colour. There are also many groups which come out against the celebration, calling it a Western import and a blot on Indian culture. This being the case it always comes out, with or without the story of St. Valentine, as an unwanted and avoidable youth celebration.

But just like Father’s day, Mother’s day and even Independence day and Republic day celebrations are a remembrance of several things, Valentine’s day is also a remembrance of something. From that perspective Valentine’s day can also be a learning for age groups other than the young and single.

Love and relationships are also cornered as something which single women and men do and it is seen as having nothing to do with married couples and the aged. So much that love is not seen as a significant aspect of marriage but instead fidelity, faithfulness, morality and longevity are. This brings me to the point that celebrations about love should be seen as an opportunity to reenergize and reevaluate existing relationships.

The criticism of celebrating Valentine’s day is always centered around the fact that it has nothing to do with a marriage or a serious relationship going towards marriage but is rather a non-serious attempt of couples professing their love to a losing cause. This is why Valentine’s day is looked at with animosity and this is also why love marriages are looked at with animosity by traditional families. Even though times are changing, this animosity still exists and parents are worried about such celebrations. But if such traditions become part of family exercises in which the aged, middle aged and young are a part of, then this animosity will change.

What does the bible say about love? 1 Corinthians 13:13 says “And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love” and it shows that love is the foundation of all religions. 1 John 4:7 says “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” again suggesting that without love we cannot know God and this is a clear message to families who are against love. John 3:16 says “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life” meaning that our very salvation is based on the fact that God loves us. The basis of every family and church thus must be love. We must do everything on this basis and whenever we question love, we are questioning God God’s self. Learning from this, we can question commercialization in society but we can’t question love, we can question erosion of true love but we can’t question love, we can question love which ferments abuse in relationships based on gender and caste but we can’t question love.

In today’s culture perhaps the biggest problem is that religion overall and Christianity specifically is adjusting itself to popular notions of security, gender relations, caste, race and class. A Valentine’s day celebration is an opportunity to pray and write that love is not a problem but the abuse of love in unequal relationships is. We need not jump onto the band wagon of love haters and groups which question love but rather need to read the bible closely and meditate on what God wants us to do.

In this context a Valentine’s day prayer would be

Lord of love, help me to pray for love that I may preach and live the gospel of love which Christ Jesus did. God of love, help me to be in active relationships of love in my house, school, college, work place and church which will make me sacrifice for the benefit of others. Holy Spirit, help me question love haters who reject couples and relationships, and thereby lead us together to spread the love of God on the cross. Amen.   

Picture credit: 4mygodsglory.wordpress.com

A prayer for the new year

Loving God, may this new year be one which realizes our potential and does not seek to satisfy others. It is not new resolutions that we need dear God, but the fulfillment of your promises. Inspire us Lord to be compassionate, merciful, understanding and adjusting. Offer the year 2017 for us and make it perfect enough for each of us in a special and different way. Instead of pressures give us challenges, instead of dejection give us new possibilities and instead of negative thoughts give us positive vibes of your wonderful energy. We pray gracious God that every day of this year 2017 be a new beginning and that these beginnings will give the passion to work hard in our lives. Help us to be formed by you and not just educated by society. May this formation offer the guidance of the Holy Spirit to recognize what is right and wrong.  Merciful God, form us to be you, so that 2017 need not be the most perfect year, but just perfect for us. Amen.  

Prayer for those suffering from demonetization of notes

Dear Lord we pray for those who have been inconvenienced due to the demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee notes. We remember the elderly, women working at home, cart vendors, small and medium families, coolies, auto rickshaw and taxi drivers, daily wage labourers and all those who have saved and not hoarded money, but have rather preferred to keep it with them. We pray for those without bank accounts, those who can’t sign a cheque and those who will feel humiliated by complex bank procedures. We stand with small scale traders and way side businesses who roll their money day to day and use the profits. We feel for those who are conducting weddings and those who expect small but significant help from several people during hospitalization. We suffer with those who are in queue outside banks and ATM’s, those who are panicking due to upcoming travel plans and those who as tourists are already touring the country. We hope and pray that as people we may help each other by waiting for payments if we can afford to and thereby helping someone who can’t pay, loaning money to those who don’t have money with them, helping some to start bank accounts with dignity and see this as a test of our character and patience. We pray God that this be a wakeup call for all to serve God and not money. We hope so much that leaders from all walks of life will stop hoarding money and refuse to make ordinary people suffer. We pray for sensitivity, trust and understanding in the minds of those in the corridors of power. May all glory and honour be to you Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.