Each day of the week, a new prayer brings into focus a different group affected by prison or criminal justice.
The Prisons Week prayer
Lord, you offer freedom to all people. We pray for those in prison. Break the bonds of fear and isolation that exist. Support with your love prisoners and their families and friends, prison staff and all who care. Heal those who have been wounded by the actions of others, especially the victims of crime. Help us to forgive one another, to act justly, love mercy and walk humbly together with Christ in his strength and in his Spirit, now and every day. Amen
Jesus looked at him and loved him (Mark 10:21)
God and Heavenly Father, please show us how we can give freely and willingly of what we possess, including our time, to serve and support those you love and care about connected with the prison system – prisoners, their families, victims of crime, and those who serve in prisons as officers, chaplains and in many other ways. Always remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, that “it is more blessed to give
than to receive”. Amen
Zacchaeus come down immediately. I must stay at your house today’ (Luke 9:15)
Welcoming God, you call us all to sit and eat with you. You know our faults before we can confess them and yet you still love us. Thank you for calling us from the places where we hide and for loving us. We pray for all those affected by prison; be with them when they are in pain, feeling sad, angry, lonely,
or betrayed.
Thank you that you stay with those who others reject. Give them eyes to see you when in places of darkness. Let them see your spark of light, receive your love, and seek to do good wherever they are. May they accept your invitation Jesus, follow your example, and know that your love can restore and transform their lives. Amen.
‘If you knew…who is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water’ (John 4:10)
Thank you, Jesus, that you came and looked for me and stayed with me when no-one else would. When I was avoiding others and hating myself. When I couldn’t see how to get out of the dark place I was in. My heart jumps a beat every time I think of you waiting patiently for me. Only you can look right into my soul and know my heart. Even knowing everything about me – what people have done to me, what I’ve done to them – you still want to pull me up and out of that hideous shame. You’ve shown me that God’s love is
more powerful than anything and lasts forever. I want others to know it too. Blessed Lord, your love and healing day after day quenches my thirst. Thank you for believing in me, for loving me. Amen
‘I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you’. (John 1:48)
Dear Lord, There are times when I think I am alone, unseen, unheard and unloved, but you are there with me always. You know me and as you say in the scripture, you see me. When I sit in quiet contemplation you are there with me, you hear my innermost thoughts, you know my sorrows and regrets. I know that you are good and as I love you, I know that you also love me. I know that you are ever present and can change the lives of those who follow you. Help me to remember that you were shunned, ignored and
disregarded, but change is possible and in you, I can lead a new life. Amen.
‘Take heart daughter, your faith has healed you’. (Matthew 9:22)
I come to you as one afflicted for years – shunned from friends and peers. I looked for help everywhere but that just added to my despair. I need to push through the crowd of doubt with prayer, but I feel unworthy. Lord, I reach for you like the lady in Matthew. Lord let me touch the outer limits of you so you can help me as you do. Oh Jesus Christ I’m scared you’ll refuse my prayer, tell me off and not care. But Lord I am there in that story – will you say, and let it be true, ‘take heart my son your faith has healed you’.
‘You are worried and upset about many things but only one thing is needed’ (Luke 10:41)
Lord Jesus, grant me wisdom and courage to find that place of balance in my life, between doing and being. There is so much hurt and need in this world that your Spirit calls me to acknowledge and respond to. Yet I know without receiving from you I become lost in busyness and have nothing to offer. So as I come to you for myself Lord, I also remember all those who seek to serve and support others, feed them and fill them to overflowing that all people will know your saving power. Amen
‘But many who are first will be last, and the last first’. (Mark 10:31)
Come Lord, break into this world of ours and reorder our understanding; where the hurt and damaged find healing, the oppressed are granted justice, and the stranger is welcomed. Stir up within us your compassion. Give us a new heart, a new vision of who we are as your people and how you call us to
live with one another. Hear our prayers for change; that your Kingdom may come here in our homes, our places of work, our prisons and our communities. Amen
Download the prayer card below.
