This Holiday Season and Beyond

Almighty God, you have blessed me
with the joy and care of children:
Give me calm strength and patient wisdom as I work with them,
that I may teach them to love whatever is
just, true, and good,
following the example of
Peace.

My students are growing up
in an unsteady and confusing world, God.
Show them that
righteousness gives more life than evil,
that light has more power than dark.
Help them to take heartache and failure not
as a measure of self
but as a chance to grow.
Help them to know that they are
persons of worth and value,
even when friends and family tell them it isn’t so.

Grant my students, colleagues, and me,
in all of our doubts and uncertainties,
the space to thrive.
Give us wisdom.
Surround us with grace.
And fill me, O God,
with a holy love that is contagious…
this holiday season and beyond.

Amen.