When our prayer is not enough...

 Scripture: Acts 16:16-34  •  Psalm 97  • Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21  • John 17:20-26

When prayers are not enough, why pray? This week, Jesus prays for us in John's gospel account before his passion. What does he pray for? Do we pray? Why do we pray? What do we pray for? What should we pray for? We can find some answers in Jesus' prayer for us. Relationship with God and one another are a couple of good reasons. And through good relationship we can learn what Jesus means "that they might be one," who our neighbors are, and how we can love God, each other, and ourselves. Debie Thomas in "On Behalf of Everyone," works through this, and ends by saying Jesus prayed for us "because he loved us too much not to. May we bravely and humbly do likewise." 

Jesus' prayer for us concludes with "so that the love with which you [the Father] have loved me may be in them, and I in them."  As Paul exhorted us in his first letter to the Corinthians, "Do all things in love."

Jesus prays that we be unified. Why? Imagine what we can do if we are unified in God's grace and presence. Read Michael Toy's "Divine Unity."

As we honor those who sacrificed tomorrow on Memorial Day, ponder Dan Clendenin's "War No More."