Prayer To Live In Unity With Those Who Are Radically Different From Us

 Unity

Never has our world seemed more divided – white and black, rich and poor, male and female, young and old, ethnic group against ethnic group, maskers or anti-maskers, left wing versus right wing political parties … and on and on. Into this very bleak environment Jesus’ prayer for unity rings out with tenderness and invitation.  Let’s join Jesus in that prayer today:

My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

John 17:20-21

I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

John 17:22-23

Lord in our world of anger, hatred, and divisions we dare to come to You today and pray with You for unity.  Your heart has always been and will continue to be that we could be joined with You and with others with a cord of unbreakable love.  We know that the only way for peace and reconciliation and union to come about is that we would be surrendered to You and Your will 100% like Jesus was.  The evil one works in so many ways to divide and destroy us and His agenda is always pushing people apart.  Your message and work, on the other hand, God is that people would be drawn close and in complete acceptance and truth, know the safety of unfailing love.  The more that is expressed the more people will see the truth of who You are and Your purposes for them and for the world.  Help us today to love You with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love our neighbour as ourselves.

We need to know and experience Your great love but as long as we live with bitterness and resentment and non-acceptance of others we put a huge barrier up that cannot be crossed.  We don’t have to agree with everything they say or do, but like You, we pray to have hearts that are open and ready to receive and forgive and be restored to right relationship.  Here and there we know some folks have to live with safe boundaries so the destructive actions and words of others don’t continue to wound and destroy.  Bless those who live with this challenge.  But many of us find the anger in our own hearts and we need to find healing and restoration that only You can give us, that Jesus won for us on the cross when He died for all sin, all wrongs, for everyone.

Jesus prayed:

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

John 17:24

Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.

John 17:25-26

Lord, we hear Your heart both for those who have received You and those who continue to reject You.  You long for them to be in right relationship with You so they can experience the love You have for them.  They don’t know all the love that’s available to them but we pray today that this will be a day of openness and receiving so the love of the Father, expressed in the gift of Jesus – his death and resurrection – might be their experienced gift today.

So, help us to live our lives in unity with You – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – and to express that tender love with everyone we meet today regardless of their political, religious, ethnic or economic stance in life. Amen

It’s a tall agenda to love people who live and think and believe radically different from what we know to be true but God is up to the challenge of helping us make all the moves that we are responsible for in this agenda of loving unity.