even in all of this, God is
a prayer for the brokenhearted and wide-awake
God,
this world is burning.
not metaphor.
not exaggeration.
but fire.
spreading like a rumor with teeth.
and we’re all breathing in the smoke.
headlines taste like ash.
policies sound like war drums.
and the faces we lift to power
keep turning away from mercy.
the violence isn’t subtle anymore
it’s schools turned into crime scenes
it’s missiles and silence
it’s parents wailing for all they lost
it’s children growing up afraid to sleep
it’s war dressed up in excuses
genocide shrugged off as politics
occupation spun as peacekeeping.
we watch
as hate breeds faster than hope,
as systems built to protect
become weapons again,
and again,
and again.
we see it
and we hate that we see it
because knowing
and not being able to stop it
feels like being set on fire from the inside out
God, we are tired.
tired of marching
and mourning.
of screaming into voids.
of whispering warnings that go unheard
until it’s too late
again.
we are scared.
not just for ourselves
but for the ones who look different
love different
believe different
and still just want to live
with breath in their lungs
and peace in their bones.
we grieve
what’s been lost, and who
names we’ll never hear,
stories cut short by hate,
and what keeps being taken
from those only dreaming of life
we grieve
the way fear
is sold like a product
hiding behind flags and pulpits and policies
all with false promises of calm.
bullets, and bombs, and boardrooms…
confusing control for care
we grieve the ways in which hate
has been fed to us as righteousness
blooming… loud and sharp and everywhere
we grieve
because this is not the world we prayed for.
and sometimes, it feels like
prayer isn’t enough.
we are spiraling, God…
spinning in circles,
trying to name what we know to be true,
trying to breathe in a world that seems to be
an endless abyss of ash and smoke
while they watch us suffocate, quietly,
calling it the hand of God.
we grieve the laws…
the ones written not to protect,
but to erase,
to silence,
to police bodies,
and bedrooms,
and identities,
and freedoms.
laws that turn our trans siblings into targets,
that tell women their pain is irrelevant,
that criminalize care and people,
that turn compassion into risk,
and turn neighbors into threats
the ones who write them…
do so with their smirks,
bibles in hands,
as if your name belongs,
an the midst of their cruelty.
God, how do we stand
when the very rules we work with are rigged?
how do we survive?
when the systems were never built with all of us in mind?
how do we breathe?
when justice keeps getting written out of the story?
so, we grieve…
with fire in our chests
and maybe that’s enough
maybe that’s where you are
not in our certainty
but in our sorrow
not in the fix
but in the fight to still feel
because God…
even now,
somewhere deep beneath the weight
beneath the wildfire
beneath the noise
we feel you.
in the ones who still show up.
in the hands that still hold on.
in the voices that won’t be quiet
even when they tremble.
you are not the God of power plays
or photo ops
or cruelty in disguise.
you are the God of the valley.
the womb.
the whisper.
the protest song.
the worn-out bodies collapsed in holy exhaustion.
you are still God.
not the God of empires,
not the God of winners,
not the God of easy answers.
you are the God of the wounded,
the weeping,
the weary,
the ones who are trying,
even if they don’t know you are there.
you are here
when the empire says you’re not.
when the world turns violent,
you turn your face toward the hurt.
you break bread with the broken.
you walk through fire with the frightened.
you cry out too.
so be with us now.
not just to comfort,
but to call us forward.
not just to calm,
but to kindle courage.
not just to carry,
but to co-create something better.
stay with us in it all,
in the midst of the smoke,
stay loud in our silence,
stay near in our spiraling,
stay soft in our fury,
and if we are to keep going,
make it holy.
make it honest.
make it love.
and make it yours.
amen.