Today, 19 August 2020, is the first day of school for our local school district. Ours is not alone, as public, private, and home schools are beginning. It feels to me like a trembling time for prayer. And so I pray:
Dear Lord God, I first make the normal prayers about our children and their educators. I pray they learn the lessons they need in order to be productive members of society who fulfill the best purposes and plans for life. I pray their curiosity will grow; their hunger for knowledge will burn, and they will master the principles of successfully navigating adulthood. I pray you protect them from those who would do harm: abusers, the violent, the emotionally debilitating, and bullies. Lord, please let us have a year without school shootings. Please.
I pray for teachers to experience fulfillment in their noble calling. I ask for relationships with parents to be edifying, partnership oriented, and beneficial for everyone. I pray for bus drivers, nutrition experts, nurses, counselors, and those who make sure the swings are safe and the toilets stay unclogged to be joyful in labor and appreciated, both in word and in reward, for all they do.
I ask that the administrators, those who make policy and decisions, will be wise and generationally motivated by their decisions.
These are our children, Oh Lord. These are the ones upon whom we heap up our hopes. Protect and nourish them in their intellect, in their body and care, and in their spiritual awareness. May kindergarteners color outside the lines, may junior high students dream of being astronauts and presidents, and may all high school seniors experience the fullness of youth and the desire for the future.
Great Almighty God, we do not live in normal times. You know this full well, and for reasons beyond our understanding, you have chosen us as the adults right now to make decisions in the middle of a pandemic. Help us to not be foolish.
I pray you keep our children, teachers, and all those who work through the school free of COVID-19. Let it not darken the door of our schools and homes. Let us be on the downside of this disease as it wanes never to return.
Even as I pray this, Oh Lord, I know you can do this, but I also know it is more likely we are challenged by a longer ordeal than we want. This seems to be the nature of growth and life. So in that context, I pray you give those making decisions insight in how to minimize the effects and spread to keep as many safe as possible. And I do ask that if the disease does continue to shrink we will be able to joyfully reopen all avenues of our life — football games, sold out musicals, and young love holding hands (only holding hands!) in the hallways.
Yet, it might turn worse. We acknowledge this. So we ask if it does, you lead those people we trust with so much of our future, the superintendents, the principals, the politicians, to make swift decisions to protect if we need to send kids home and shelter longer on-line and at home. Let us be wise and not sacrifice the future for the moment. Let no child die, let no teacher die, let no lunch lady die, Precious Lord, because we were too impatient about getting on with life and meetings and mammon.
We do not know how this will work. None of us do. We do know that you are the Lord and this is not the first time disease has played a heavy hand in humanity. Allow us grace toward one another. Remove the enemy’s divisive tone and hateful anger that has caused us to distrust one another. Please work in and through us to bring unity, and I pray you use those of us who call you Lord in such work that we may be a Balm of Gilead to a sick world, a world sick with more than C19, but sick with the sin of pettiness.
Jesus, my heart is heavy. I am hopeful and horrified at the same time. And I am not alone. We need you to heal us. Holy Spirit, we are desperate for illumination and guidance. Father, we plead for your strength. Amen.