Listen Lord: We Hate it Here - Day Five
Prayers from God’s Children Experiencing Racism
In Mark chapter 1, after John’s baptizing, the Spirit sends Jesus “at once” out into the wilderness. The Bible says “he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.”
My immediate thought when I read this passage this morning was !!Oh Lord if that ain’t all the people on this earth right here!? I won’t list or replay the news stories I have heard or the eye-bleeding press briefings I take in TEENY doses. I will say that my prayers yesterday, for all our babies and all of us, that was serious. My children are so confused, and they can see right through me as I parent through silent tears and mounting fears.
For this morning, for this day and all of the coming days, we believe that the word from the Lord is “do not fear”. We believe the word from the Lord is “take courage”. I believe that in times like these, we must remember that the nameless and all powerful Holy Spirit is known by traits that display connection and communion in and out of the physical. The Spirit is in forms of wisdom and comfort, answers to the names Helper, Guide. When we are tempted to doubt and despair in the wilderness, pressed by an enemy of vanity and terror, we are attended by the Spirit who gives us a testimony.
Today we join the prayers of our faith family members who experience racism in these already trying seasons. We are yelling “If this man says Chinese virus ONE MORE TIME”, and the Spirit is offering a righteous rage that need not lead to stress. I believe that Jesus was beyond done with the devil. Starving, thirsty, angry and alone. Yet his speech was doubtless, because his heart was sure. This kind of spiritual steadfastness can only come from constant communication with a God who never slumbers, and always listens.
Let’s talk to God together. Lord we come this morning to sit at your kitchen table, like little children hungry for the daily bread of life. Like empty pitchers carried to a full fountain, inanimate until the water of life streams through us, we are brought by Your Spirit and our lack.
And if you would Lord, fill us with love for one another. Bury our biases in the dust, and bind our hearts together across the cosmos at your feet. We are coming to you this morning, Lord, joining the prayers of your children who are experiencing racist hatred. Energize our spirits this morning, wash our hearts as surely as we must wash our hands. Anoint us all over with the divine essential oil of empathy. Name our bodies as sacred, our prayers as a sweet aroma of worship, and O Lord, if you would, listen.
Listen Lord: We are Asian. We are erased when our names are deemed too difficult to pronounce. We are forgotten when our stories are seen as too complex for Western tropes and tongues. We are quarantined to prejudiced places, type cast to cultural margins. We are dehumanized when political leaders blame us for global suffering. We are a people, not a pandemic. You see us, O God. Our names are written in Your hands. You have not forgotten us, but it feels like a fight to be remembered. Our personhood is mishandled by the historical fear-born habit of making monoliths out of multitudes. Korea is China is India is Iran. We are losing patience and we’re tempted to despair. We hate it here.
Listen Lord: We are immigrants and refugees. We are Black and brown, we call you by different names. We are culture carriers but blamed for unemployment. We are multilingual masses better known by “broken english and funny accents.” Stretched between borders, lands, and seas, we face impossible choices and challenges in search of safety, home, and solace. Too often our sojourns end in sorrows. Our little ones have been stolen from us, families have been splintered and separated. We have been cast out of our lands. Our new homes have forgotten that we are neighbors, and often the church forgets that we are your children. They call us strangers in a land that does not belong to them! So we hate it here.
Listen Lord: We are Black. Twice-kissed by the sun and twice-acquainted with the world’s grief. We are light brown auburn-haired, and still called non-black/too fair. We are dark skinned onyx crisp clear night, yet feared in all hemispheres. But You oh Lord, You have crowned us all Black and beautiful. You birthed in us a resistance of resilience. The fight is long and hard, but give us purpose, Lord. Send a foretaste of the end you have foreseen. Meantime, we wade waters deep and dangerous. In this season of history repeating itself, we are seen to be stronger than sickness, assumed immune to human pain. We are in chains and cages more than any other people in the United States, so we weep for our loved ones at higher risk of sickness in this time of crisis. We still look to You, our great and only Sun who first kissed the ancestors, to brighten our days until that great day O Lord, the great gettin up morning when we are free to be in every place. Until that is our reality, Lord God, we need a renewed of hope, for we feel that we are forever far from the fullness of freedom. We are in constant mid-conquer, and we hate it here.
O Lord, your children are sick and sore. We’re thinned out from stretching smiles, and starved of joy. We are grieving. We are separated from people we love. We are afraid of the days to come and are beginning to feel a loss of our laughter. Stop by our houses and hovels this morning, bring a burst of life into these burned out brains. Move our bodies to the beautiful rhythms you built into us from birth. Yes, revive, renew, remind, oh Lord. And when our arms stretch, when our feet step, when our voices rise, when finally - freely - we can truly lift every voice as high as the skies, we pray and we believe today, that you will be listening.
Scripture
Ecclesiastes 1 - for feeling all the feelings
Ruth 1 - for a story of connection in times of loss and displacement
Hebrews 11 - for encouragement from the faith-family tree
Stories of the Saints
AAPIs for Black Lives: a movement-sparking moment in recent history that deserves more praise.
Sacred Songs
‘Til I Met Thee, Cody Chestnutt
His Eye is On the Sparrow, Whitney Houston performance
We’ve Come This Far By Faith, Donnie McClurkin performance
images: Christ is in every person by Attila Jandi // Minority Mental Health, First Person // Harmonia Rosales, Black Imagery to Counter Hegemony