Two years ago we used this prayer during our Pentecostal services. What has changed? What still needs devotion and time to change and how do we interrupt these behaviors.

We will pray for justice to be served.
We will pray for black lives to not be disregarded,
We will pray for black bodies to live and breathe in the breath of god.
We will pray for peace and calm to return some day,
but we honor the need to demand justice first.
We will pray that we will be united as one human family. We will pray for us to hold the complexities of this history we are living.
For those of us who are white we will pray that we hear the winds of pentecost,
and not dismiss them as if they were merely drunk,
that we will see the fires and know a fire has been burning for a long time.
That the world is always ending for someone, somewhere.
We will pray that That we learn about our own complicity in the racial structure that keeps some people down and prop others up.
We will pray That we find ways to hear other voices,
That we don’t believe superficial analysis,
We will pray that we will work to dismantle our own privilege where we have it,
so that others can breathe.
We pray for the people who have had to stand too close to their neighbors in order to demand justice.
Who have hugged and cried out together and used shared microphones, and helped each other with milk after teargas and wounds from rubber bullets.
We will pray that this closeness doesn’t end up killing more people from covid 19 who will find once again that they can’t breathe.
We will pray that we will be on the side of the siezed, dragged, attacked, stripped beaten and killed and we know for a fact that Jesus is one of them.
That jesus also experienced all of that.
That there was a moment when Jesus could say,
“I can’t breathe.”
That jesus is there now.
And that there is life after all this death.
We will pray that when people are being harmed we’ll stand up for what’s right.
And please God We will pray that we do more than just pray. Until all actually means all. Amen