Prayer to renew our commitment

Acts 10:39 “They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.”

In recent weeks, we again have witnessed how we (because I am complicit) continue to respond differently to the death of whites and blacks and the reality that there are always voices ready to shout “crucify” against the One who names our brokenness–our sinfulness that separates us from God’s desire to know and be known by all God’s children. I confess as a preacher I want an Easter celebration that is predictable and joyful, not one that confronts controversy and proclaims unpopular truth and ends with fear and confusion like what the women experience at the empty tomb.

Good Friday marks the crucifixion–the execution–of Jesus by a world not ready to love as God loves us.

April 4, 1968 bore witness to another execution, the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who preached the disruptive Gospel and asked the world to challenge our assumptions about who God loves.

Fifty years later we can be discouraged by the difficulty of the work. We can lament how little has changed. We who are white pastors can continue to be convicted by the truth of his Letter from the Birmingham Jail. But we must not deny God’s steadfast presence in the world and in this work. And wherever we are on April 4, 2018, we can renew our commitment to call a thing what it is and name the persistent sin of racism and bigotry in ourselves, our neighborhoods and communities and, yes, in the Church.

Holy and Liberating God,

I give thanks for Your steadfast love and mercy, reforming and renewing me every morning.

I confess that I sleep when I should be woke;

I stay silent when I should speak;

I feast when I should fast.

Break the bonds of sin, of bigotry, racism and hatred and rescue me from evil.

Give me strength to pray with my feet wherever I am and courage to use my privilege and my voice to preach Your disruptive gospel always.

I pray with confidence that You accompany me and make all things–especially hard things–possible.

In the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

–The Rev. Christina L. Auch (Ascension, Shelby)
Written on Maundy Thursday, 2018, as I’m about to reflect on the Three Days of Easter.