January 31, 2022, | by Dr. Barbara Williams-Skinner | NCNW National Chaplain and President of Skinner Leadership Institute
O Lord our God whose name is Almighty, and whose works are wondrous, we pause at the beginning of a New Year to give you praise. How grateful that you thought enough of us that you did not start the year without us. We never would have made it through last year’s life-altering pandemic, sicknesses and deaths of loved ones and colleagues, and jolting changes in our nation had it not been for the Lord on our side. You are our ever-present rock, redeemer, fortress, and strength in times of trouble...and we thank you.
Lord God, in a year of new possibilities for our nation, and our lives, we are standing confidently on your word to the prophet Isaiah, "See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:19)
God, we believe you to make a way in the wilderness of America’s rapidly deteriorating race relations, child poverty, eroding democracy, wealth inequality, the opioid crisis, climate calamities, and immigration disasters in a continuing deadly pandemic.
Lord, we ask you to do what only you can do. Do a new thing, Lord, in and through us this year, so we as your handiwork begin to see ourselves anew as ambassadors of your love in unloving times, bridge-builders amidst warring factions and messengers of hope in times or despair. We pray in your mighty, matchless, and magnificent name, Lord God. Amen.
