“I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” Amos 5:21,24
I lift my eyes to the hills, Holy God, from where will our help come? We pray for those confused and demoralized by our system of justice – an indiscriminate system that is just for some, but not for all. We pray for those who watch the news, who can’t keep themselves from following every trial, who can’t keep from hoping and praying for justice, yet who also can’t forget our history.
We pray for those who can’t forget Jacob Blake, Ahmaud Arbery, or the Black boys who lost trials and decades of their lives in prison. God of Glory, may these brothers and sisters know the peace only you can provide.
We pray also for those with the luxury of forgetting history, those whose privilege protects them from the pain of this moment, those whose lives need not be interrupted by controversial trials, or breaking news, or an urgent need to work for a more equitable world. To benefit from unjust systems is its own dehumanizing prison. God, in your mercy, liberate us to be more humane.
Embolden us all, Holy God, to interrogate our systems and structures, to risk creative change, to listen to people long silenced and to work for peace. Hear us as we pray that justice will roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
Amen.