Here’s a prayer I’m working on for a service at the end of October, which I’m hoping to frame as a celebration of the Workers amongst us and the essential task of Work.
So often in the life of our churches we miss out on including and celebrating how people spend the bulk of their waking time - in work. This is becoming more obvious to me as we see an increase in people working such odd hours and such long hours. So long or odd in fact that church on Sunday morning seems more like torture than blessing. Maybe we should hold the service over lunch?
Anyway, I’m hoping to make a space to celebrate workers and our work. Here’s the prayer.
Make comments if you like. Use it if you like.
SAVE US AND BLESS US.
God of light and life,
save us and bless us
in our work.
Save us not from hard work,
for in hard work
our life’s purpose can be found.
Save us instead
from work that is meaningless,
from days that are uninspired.
Save us from relentless travel
and the tyrany of distance
that we so readily accept
as normal these days.
Save us from bosses
who crush and bind their workers
rather than lifting and enabling them.
Save us from work-mates
who refuse to communicate,
or who communicate all too freely.
Save us from our own impatience,
when things aren’t going our way,
even when we’re right about it.
Save us from our own ego
that seeks out every inch of the limelight,
and tempts us to diminish others.
Save us from ruthlessness,
and soul-less work practices,
all in the name of getting ahead.
Save us from … (instert your own prayer here)
God of light and life,
save us and bless us
in our work.
Bless us not with riches and notoriety,
for these are not
the clear markers of good work.
Bless us instead with a deep sense
of purpose and meaning
in our work.
Bless us with the joy of knowing
that we make a difference,
and our efforts are valuable.
Bless us with quiet morning-tea chats
seated around the coffee table.
Bless us with small smiles,
and pleases and thank-yous
between colleagues in a rush.
Bless us with work that stretches us
and calls us to keep getting better
at what we do.
Bless us with evidence of our good work
that goes beyond a mere pay-rise
or end-of-year bonus.
Bless us with an end-of-year bonus
from a business that has benefited
from our hard work.
Bless us with each day’s rest from working,
and the discipline
to leave our work behind as we rest.
Bless us with … (insert your own prayer here)
God of light and life,
save us and bless us
in our work.
AMEN.
(Blair Cameron, 2008)
