Confusing Our Enemies: A Prayer for Christian Reconciliation
The following prayer was delivered by pastor Andrew Cheung as part of the May 8 installment of our 2024 Faith & Politics Prayer Call series.
Living God, our creator who spoke all creation into motion simply by your word, our sovereign one who sits above all created beings and all human institutions, we lift our eyes and our hearts to you today, reminding ourselves that you are rich in wisdom and abundant in love.
As we think about our nation and the state of our politics, we name our disappointments, our disillusionments, and our despair. We confess that we too often place our hopes in the ideals of our political leaders and parties rather than in the ideals of your kingdom. We have chosen to align ourselves with people who are more socially or theologically or ideologically like us, rather than aligning ourselves with Jesus—the one we proclaim, the one we worship—and with our fellow siblings in Christ's body. We lament the ways that this divisiveness has broken the fellowship of love, humility and sacrificial service that is meant to reflect your character.
Oh God, we have responded out of fear. Fear of change, fear of being abused or marginalized, and fear of the other (whoever the other might be) rather than responding with deep hope and trust in your love and your faithfulness to your people.
We lift up our friends, our family members and our neighbors whose relationships with one another have been fractured by political polarization. We ask for your spirit of comfort and wisdom to meet them, to heal them, to heal us, and to reveal a way forward. We pray to have courageous conversations that reflect the fruits of the spirit of God.
We also pray against the work of the enemy who seeks to sow discord and mistrust even within the body of Christ. We pray against the tactics of domination and deceit that seek to shame our opponents. We have confused our political opponents with the true enemy of our souls. We are reminded that for those who have put their trust in Christ's life, death and resurrection, the real enemy of sin and its curse, death, have been defeated. So we are secure. We have hope we can live differently.
Reconciliation across any difference is a possibility because the greatest reconciliation in the universe has become a reality in Christ. May you give us eyes to see our world differently. Give us humility to name where we have misplaced our hopes. Give us comfort in our disappointment, and grant us wisdom and courage to speak with humble love and prophetic boldness. Help us to be wise as serpents and gentle as doves. Let us be faithful apprentices of Jesus wherever you call us to be to the glory of God with the help of the Holy Spirit.
In the name of the mighty name of Jesus we pray.
Amen.
Rev. Andrew Cheung is pastor of Washington Community Fellowship in Washington, DC, and a board member of Evangelicals4Justice. Andrew identifies as “a spiritual mutt within Christian orthodoxy,” and served as a staff pastor in a variety of Protestant traditions before coming to Washington Community Fellowship.