A Concord Pastor Comments: Pause for Prayer: TUESDAY 6/9

How do you keep track of all our stories, Lord?
Especially since every individual's story
is so entwined, connected and mixed up
with so many other people's stories?

Does the entanglement of our stories
make it easier or more difficult
to keep track of them all?

Each of us has a story and each of our stories
has a history, has its own collection of personal stories,
tucked, hidden, embedded in our hearts...

Some of those stories are decades long
and others so much shorter, Lord,
but each one has a tale to tell
known better by you than the teller...

You know the story of the pain we hold fast,
and the hurts we've long forgotten;
you know all we hope and pray for,
all we scheme and dream of...

You know the stories of the gifts we missed,
when, too busy or too angry,
we failed to see what fell into our laps...

You know the secrets in our stories, Lord:
our sin and shame and all the things
we wish we could forget but can't -
though it was long ago that you forgave
and washed away what haunts us still...

You understand our stories, Lord,
and with compassion you retell them,
with your mercy woven in,
gracefully redacting and amending
any selfish pages...

You invite us, one and all,
to weave our stories tight with yours:
your words becoming ours
'til our stories more and more become
an accounting of our faith in you,
a telling of your love, a narrative of peace
offered, made and shared with all
who have a place in the story of our lives...

You know us and our stories well, Lord,
stories entwined, connected and mixed up
with so many other people's tales,
you remember and understand them all...

Help us shape, tell and live our stories, Lord,

with a truth that brings to each

a joyful, peaceful end...

Amen.