A Blessing to Stretch Our Hearts

This is the prayer we prayed after the message on Sunday. See if you connect with parts of it and talk with Jesus about what stands out to you.

“A Blessing for Stretching Our Hearts”

One: God, our lives have too many things.

Many: Awful. Lovely. Full. Shockingly incomplete.

One: Will you help us learn to live with a greater capacity for this?

Many: Living in the tension between a life that has worked out…

And one that has gone to hell in every handbasket.

All: Let today be a divine exercise of yes… and.

One: Yes, I have so much to be thankful for,

Many: And this hasn’t turned out like I thought it would.

One: Yes, I feel moments of joy,

Many: And I have lost more than I could live without.

One: Yes,I want to make the most of today,

Many: And my body keeps breaking.

One: Yes, I am hopeful

Many: And this is daunting.

One: Yes, I am trying to be brave,

Many: And I feel so afraid.

One: So bless me, bless us, trying to live between these two words,

Many: Yes… and.

One: May we understand this is where the real work of life is found.

Many: Where it takes courage to live,

One: Where grief can strip us to the studs,

Many: And love can remake us once again.

One: Where our hearts can be both broken and keep on beating,

Many: Never sorry to have broken at all.

All: Yes… and.

One: Make us capable of great joy, great love, great risk, even fear,

Many: As you expand our hearts with this yes… and today.

• Adapted from the work of Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie, The Lives We Actually Have: Blessings for Imperfect Days