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A Prayer About Palms Up Care-Casting

     Casting all your care on him because he cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7

     Dear Father, I woke up much earlier than usual today, and it didn’t take coffee to get me going. I’ve got a lot on my mind, and even more stirring in my heart. In the chaos, it’s incredibly comforting to lay claim to the riches of this verse and to be certain of your care. Assurance of your care is always good news to me, but especially this morning. The combination of what I’ve taken on plus the burdens that have been laid at my feet are way too much for me to carry.  I need your big heart and broad shoulders.

     By faith… right now… with palms up, I cast my cares upon you, gracious Father. Carry my burdens for the people I love—dear friends I so wish I could change. The domino effect of their destructive choices is affecting many others.

     Sometimes I foolishly think if you’d only let me be the 4th member of the Trinity for 15 minutes I could do a lot of good in the lives of a lot of people. What arrogance. You haven’t called us to fix anyone, but to love them as Jesus loves us. To cast our cares on you isn’t to shirk our responsibilities, but it is to remember that you are God and we are so very not.

     Receive my concerns about living in a world with a broken economy—one in which good friends lose jobs, neighbors lose homes, children grow fears, and life gets painfully disrupted.

     Take the heavy load I feel for fellow pastors who are in the crazy-making turmoil of life in the local church. At times it seems like the only solution would be for you to send revival or send Jesus back, either of which would be welcomed. But at least bring the gospel to bear with fresh power where my friends serve. Humble the proud… soften the hard… quiet the tongues… grant gospel-sanity once again.

     I cannot add one minute to my life through worry. In fact, I can take a lot away from my life through trying to carry burdens you alone can carry. Turn my “What if’s?” into “Now that’s”… Now that Jesus has risen and is enthroned, everything has changed.

     You’ve numbered my hairs and my days. You have the hearts of every king in your hand. Nothing catches you off-guard or by surprise. There are no wrinkles in your brow or second-guessing in your courts. You give and you take away, blessed be your name, O, Lord.

     Whenever I am tempted to doubt your burden bearing care, may Jesus’ cross loom large in my gaze. For it was there, Father, you bore the greatest of all my burdens… my sin, and you demonstrated the incomparable extent of your care. So very Amen, I pray with palms up, in Jesus’ matchless and merciful name.

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