“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with your entire mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it; you shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two great commandments.” (Mt. 22:34-40 and Luke 10:25-27)
Most Lovely, Merciful, Lord, Jesus Christ, You Who reached beyond the man-imagined ethnic boundaries between Samaritan, Roman and Jew, You Who loves and delights in all peoples, You Who gave clear sight to the blind and freedom to captives, we stand in awe before You. All Americans, as does Your Church, stand guilty of racism before You. Most all, if not all, of America’s sins and faults lie at the door step of the Church, as we are guilty of disobedience to Your command and expectation that we would be salt and light in the world we live. We have come up extremely short in being the better, loving example. I beg Your forgiveness and guidance. LORD, help us to break down the walls we alone have built in our nation, enable us to see the reality of racism and bigotry, and free us to challenge and displace it from ourselves, our nation, and our world. Will You open our hearts and minds to celebrate similarities and differences among all our brothers and sisters? We place our hopes for racial harmony in Your healing hands and our own obedient hearts, under the influence of Your Spirit, in the name above all names, Jesus our King, Amen!
