Author: Jayson

God,

Mandate renewed. White votes aplenty.

Give him the white heart proclaiming.

And with him a deputy, narrowly won.

The same total elected odd partners.

Deal or no deal? God, only you know.

The voting is maintained clandestine.

Opposite camps, but yet status quo—

The devil you know bests the stranger.

Opinion of many: Devils them all.

Has anything changed since the polling?

A tighter result but no serious threat,

Unless in the laws—coalitions.

Prime minister soon. President maybe.

Will any foundations be shaken?

Industrious spirit, accountable charge.

Renewal within, from the margins.

We pray, God, for more. Renewal at the top.

A white heart to lead every leader.

Transform the whole, the new blood and old.

The nation to follow—then prosper.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

One hundred twenty-eight.

Some new, some old.

Some enrage. Some inspire.

Some with me and mine. Some with them—still us.

Help us to remember.

And each one has a name and face.

Remember all—I cannot.

And here: I dare not list each one.

Yes, they are yours. And yes, they are ours.

Yes, each one in need of prayer.

But a list will not help me.

I scroll past, skim through. Whisper generic good for all.

Maybe some are more righteous than me.

How do you keep track of eight billion?

But I can pray for trends:

Bless those who come with noble aims, for whom ‘kulun yani’ kul shi.*

Now among 128. Do they join in or holdout with nose up?

God, guide them well, for change must come. New blood renews the languid.

But guide them wise, their number weak, no matter how much rising.

Bless those who come with single mind, that weapons rig the system.

Their number up, the platform theirs. Discussion, tabled, threatening.

But is it time? And can they win? What consequences suffered?

To themselves? Or to the south? Or to nation collapsing?

Bless those who lost the upper hand, who still promote their project.

Calls for reform, resistance true, with forces piled against them.

But humbled, may they humble still. Others strong. All servants?

Bless those of old, the way things were. And likely still are, maybe.

They care for own, protect their flock. Distribute jobs and money.

Should it all be swept aside? Can they sustain the model?

With ever shrinking slice of pie, help them to help all others.

Renew, or rig?

Reform, or rile?

Among each group – dishonest.

We asked before: Remove such men.

But wheat and chaff still present.

Bless them also. Change their ways. And bind manipulation.

But now we have them. So change me too.

For each one, make us thankful.

They came from you. They came from us. They now are the solution.

Help me to pray—by name—for some.

The rest, God, shepherd. Lead them.

Amen.

*The popular chant of the 2019 uprising was: All of them means all of them. Here, the phrase is adjusted to: ‘All of them means’ everything.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

Keep today safe. Make today just.

But justice is a hard word:

It means so many things to so many people.

Make it what it means to you.

But then, God, is it judgment?

If so, it starts with us.

Remove the planks from our eyes. Try me and know my inmost thoughts.

David preferred your wrath to the nations’. Job repented, mute.

Your discipline comes with purpose.

Your mercy mixed with tears.

May we shed them also.

And spare us the blood.

It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

So we humble ourselves, instead.

We fall on our knees.

We trust your hands to shake us.

We trust your hands to heal.

No matter the meaning, we all want a change.

And so we pray the principles:

Put your candidates in office. Hold accountable the frauds.

Expose manipulation. The common interest, first.

Take these prayers, from all of us. Will my plea cancel his?

No, each prayer folded over, pressed together, overflows.

The measure we pray – measure it true.

To us and to Lebanon.

For elections, for life.

Your will to be done. Your kingdom to come.

My vote makes a difference.

Your justice, how odd.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

When all is bad, we still fear worse. But hope holds on that change will come.

Every billboard says so.

But what is the substance? What is the plan? This face or that one? My list, not his?

Beyond the names, what parties?

The red we know. The yellow-green. Who else is campaigning? The logos retreat.

One week remaining.

What of the rumors? Elections postponed? It seemed all in favor though no one would say.

Is a crisis coming?

God, spare us from violence. But spare us from doubt. A vote is a privilege that many don’t have.

The Arab world is arid.

Help us be faithful even if depressed. The barriers many: Cross-country, to drive.

Elite entrenchment.

But also infighting of everyone else. Media partisan. Confusing law. Regional meddling.

My ballot, to speak.

I cast it in hope that the message is heard. With enough of my comrades perhaps we can win.

Or voided, vote blank.

It too will say something, rejecting the whole. Fulfillment of duty, wash hands of results.

God, you know.

And God, you care. But towards what end? That this corrupt fall or to set back that sect?

You choose the king.

But so do I. Align my will. Dedicate me to the cause. Through me help bring the best of us.

And then, to rest.

Your favor does not come with prince, but faithfulness to prince of peace. Change itself

Can never change.

So while we work in vigilance, we ask you also change the heart. Bring repentance to our soul.

Love of neighbor. Also—them.

One week away, we ask your grace. Bring this nation toward the good; politicians, honest, pure.

But first, change me.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

The vote is free. The people, too, or is there occupation?

Politics manipulates. Licit or illegal?

From north to south, and in Beirut, campaigning is disrupted.

But so are lives. The poster size offends the sinking lira.

Politicians show their plans—or at least their faces.

But some denied in neighborhoods where rivals show displeasure.

Provocation? Threatened quit. Rumors of postponement.

Who will win when many hate each color, list, and slogan?

Yet even those who herald change have failed to stay united.

They scratch and claw for every vote. One seat—or two—a triumph.

Division, God, is not of you. But nor is it unrighteous.

People differ, weigh their choice. And power is a blessing.

Used instead to silence voice, or raise a fear of ‘other,’

It weaponizes stewardship. It bludgeons trust and service.

Helpless, God, we but can pray? And vote in resignation?

Or will through prayer a miracle give mandate to my favored?

A miracle is needed, God.

But is it in elections?

Change the system. Change the heart.

Change the expectations.

But until then, let vote be free. The people, too, in conscience.

Their ballot cast by principle. On time, while safe and honest.

The king, you say, is in your hand—wicked, just, or tepid.

Guide voters, then, with virtue sure—conviction, courage, honor.

Many lack these marks of strength, the leading class deficient.

But all fall short of your demand to imitate our master.

Humble us, God.

Rebuild us right.

Let Lebanon freely prosper.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

I cannot say I know the cause, and many more are like me too.

But it does not look good.

Bankers reject the government plan.

Protestors rally where lawmakers meet.

But is business aligned with the people?

How to pray, except for good, when most of the small print escapes us?

And what of the pharmacist, killed in her store?

Or expat electors pulled in tug-of-war?

Better known yet is the poverty push

That dares some to risk life and limb to escape.

Some have drowned.

Some drown in blame.

Some—more than me—know the issues quite well.

Some are complicit in many a crime,

While some seek out facts keen to educate.

Give them ears, God. Too many are not listening.

We know why, and it is fair:

The hand has been nailed immobile.

So like your own, it sags inert,

Waiting for one to unpin it.

You rose from the dead by the power of God,

But came down from the cross with assistance.

Where now is Joseph, from Arimathea?

His humble act, far from the crowd—

But brave in approaching authority—

It set the stage for miracle,

Though he himself did little.

God, find these men, and amplify.

Bolster their spirits, in number.

And then, when few are watching, where only women linger:

Show yourself.

Birth new life.

Let Lebanon once again prosper.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.

God,

We thank you for agreement, though many say its false.

And naught but shame can come upon the architects of loss.

It is not wise to borrow. Worse: Surrender on a debt.

Rely on outside help to fix a problem of one’s own.

The terms of reference, strident. Reforms, we surely need.

But will these straighten Lebanon for finance or the poor?

At least there is consensus, for now, on what to do.

Conditional on follow-up; will implementing fail?

And what then of elections? Will mandate carry through?

And how long will it take until a government is formed?

Could help—now—come from elsewhere? A bailout before loan?

Will friends—again—from Saudi prove their friendship at the bank?

At least they have returned, God. An empty embassy

Is more than just a symbol of relations gone awry.

But this week things are better, and all across the board.

A glimpse of hope, ephemeral? Or first look at the roots?

Distrust appears endemic. Manipulation, fierce.

The sins of men run deep within the soil of ancient land.

God grant them all discernment, and courage to address

Corruption and entitlement distributed by sect.

Some must fall entire. Others to redeem.

Promote the honest faithful; may their influence expand.

No more ad hoc solutions, as each blame someone else.

Let justice paint with broadest brush. But mercy, beautify.

The landscape is angelic. Your praise, each day, it sings.

Draw people to the chorus from cacophony of angst.

From president to doorman, from cleric to the cook,

All are equal in your sight and each with vital role.

Perhaps a loan is coming. Renewed support from Gulf.

Be warned: No trust in princes. Wealth: Moth and rust destroy.

You, oh God, are holy. Yet you love us. You forgive.

Reveal it now in Lebanon. Humbled, prayerful—heal.

Amen.

To receive Lebanon Prayer by WhatsApp, please click this link to join the closed comments group.

Lebanon Prayer places before God the major events of the previous week, asking his favor for the nation living through them.

It seeks for values common to all, however differently some might apply them. It honors all who strive on her behalf, however suspect some may find them.

It offers no solutions, but desires peace, justice, and reconciliation. It favors no party, but seeks transparency, consensus, and national sovereignty.

How God sorts these out is his business. Consider joining in prayer that God will bless the people and establish his principles, from which all our approximations derive.

Sometimes prayer can generate more prayer. While mine is for general principles, you may have very specific hopes for Lebanon. You are welcome to post these here as comments, that others might pray with you as you place your desires before God.

If you wish to share your own prayer, please adhere to the following guidelines:

1) The sincerest prayers are before God alone. Please consult with God before posting anything.

2) If a prayer of hope, strive to express a collective encouragement.

3) If a prayer of lament, strive to express a collective grief.

4) If a prayer of anger, refrain from criticizing specific people, parties, sects, or nations. While it may be appropriate, save these for your prayers alone before God.

5) In every prayer, do your best to include a blessing.

I will do my best to moderate accordingly. Thank you for praying for Lebanon and her people.