Gracious God, You meet us in unexpected places. Traces of Your grace are strewn all over our schedule-puckered lives. We ask to be stirred and disturbed toward soul-satisfying results in our desires to serve You and neighbor and even our enemy. Ease us into being good Samaritans to each other, to the outcast and rejected ones, and to those whose fear sometimes makes them obnoxious. Make us bold to call others to accountability—even as we model humility to the arrogant, mercy to the self-righteous, compassion to the indifferent. O God of many surprises, make us glad of heart for each day’s opportunities to bring our imagination and creativity to the disturbances that threaten to discourage us. We will continue to believe in the impossible.—AMEN.
(Adapted from Ted Loder, My Heart in My Mouth.)