Wednesday Prayers: Classmates

I am hugely, enormously relationship-based. I love solitude, but even my time alone is often spent in relationship-- with God, or with beloved writers. So it's no surprise that, as I look forward to the beginning of my first semester of seminary, I'm thinking about relationships.

I'm praying, starting now, but hopefully up to and beyond graduation, that my classmates and I learn to love each other. If loving God and loving others is the foundation of our ministries (of our lives!), then look! We have each other to practice on. There will be scores of us, and of course we won't all become close. But we CAN all love each other.

I pray we learn to deal graciously and generously with one another, that we learn to hear what people are saying (rather than holding it up to what WE would say). I pray that we act both kindly and honestly. I pray that we trust each other, and that we earn that trust. I pray that we celebrate our truest selves, rather than dismissing our colleagues with superficial assumptions. The God who is Love will be with us always, among us and within us. May we truly serve that God.

Can I pray over your efforts to love and be loved? Let me know.