You are not alone… Opioid Epidemic… A Prayer

You’re Not Alone – Be Not Afraid: Words of Hope
For those affected by the opioid crisis
New Life Community Church

This prayer was offered last evening as we gathered for You’re Not Alone

Creator God,

We pray; buffeted by the waves of addiction
taking the loves of young and older
to where you never intended them to go…

We live with a sense of powerlessness,
unmanageability, a swirls of insanity –

How could this be? How could this be, God?
How could those we know and love
be so captured, so controlled,
so lost…

We know the loss of balance. We come here, to prayer,
to center, to heal,
to learn how to respond.

Our Communication with those we love and care for
becomes strained, if not lost.
Why won’t they listen? Why can’t they listen.
How do we hear their cries,
before the cries become our own?

Guilt shadow us all around, as if we had one something wrong
As if we had caused the problem
“If only we had done this or that…
If only…”
If only it were that simple.

Attempts at amends, reconciliation, intervention –
all we can think of to make this better…
to make them better…
do not always succeed.

Dear, God, what can we do to know our loved ones
again,
as we once did…

Or to remember those already lost now n the love of your embrace
holding them, for us who mourn,
and not enough for those of us who mourn.

We come together in these thoughts, concerns and
determination.

We gather because you give us strength together.
We join here in the company of one another, in reverence
and trust and hope
and the joy of knowing you are here and guiding us.

Help us to rely on you and how you lead us,
help us to be ready. Help us to hope, without ceasing.
We are willing to listen, to be shown what to do to help
We are ready to recognize that we cannot do this alone;
we need help, too.

You are the One who has the power.
Let us be your light and your action that illumines the way forward;
make us strong in doing what is needed to break this cycle of addiction
in our lives, our community and our nation.

Make us restorers of loving wholeness in the ways we may,
challengers of systems that enable this scourge of opioid abuse.
And let us not be silent, but be full of your Voice
in the chorus of our prayers, our love, our support of each others
and our actions.

We are not alone. We need not be afraid.
We need to be present and strong, together and loud enough
for all to hear our hope in your love and our determination
to change what needs changing,
to do whatever needs to be done.

We are with you. More than that, you are with us.
Thank God – and thank God for God.

Amen.

~Ray Bagnuolo, October 4, 2017

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