Marked

A pastoral prayer written for The First Baptist Church of Austin on the occasion of our first worship service back in person inside our building. 

The passage of time is uniquely a human experience. 

We experience life in stages marked by milestones like birthdays, school graduations, weddings, job promotions, divorce, and death. We come to expect these events to help mark the special from the mundane of the day to day.  Sometimes they are joyful and other times these markers are the hardest things we will ever have to go through.

We never expected to add “pandemic” to the list our list of time markers. 

The past year and a half has been one that we all experienced in different ways. 

Marked by the passing of friends and relatives, the pain of loneliness, or the fear of the unknown, we enter this space changed people this morning. 

We are grieving in a new way. 

Grieving those we lost. 

Grieving the time that passed between visits to loved ones.  

Grieving all we missed out on. 

Grieving how the world has changed 

and how our lives were turned upside down.

Our hearts are heavy today. 

We are changed.  

But we move forward, 

        hand in hand

                with our corporate traumas

seeking your comfort, your grace, your strength, your love and your eternal assurance that you are with us always. 

May we not return to normal, but seek a new way to experience you....to be open to the new you things you are doing. 

Give us the grace to see it and say yes to participate in it.

Lord God, hear our prayers. Amen.