We Pray To You, O Lord

Scripture — 1 Timothy 2:1-7 (NRSV)

First of all, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For

there is one God;
there is also one mediator between God and humankind,
Christ Jesus, himself human,
who gave himself a ransom for all

—this was attested at the right time. For this I was appointed a herald and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.

Devotion

When I joined the Episcopal Church several decades ago, one of the things I had to get used to was the Prayers of the People. Not just praying people—I had run into a bunch of those before—but the actual liturgical action called the Prayers of the People.

In the tradition I came from, we had a “pastoral prayer.” Folks might share prayer requests beforehand, either out loud in the service or through written means, but the pastor ultimately gathered all of those prayers up and lifted them before the Lord. And, in fact, in the Episcopal Church prior to the current Book of Common Prayer, which came out in 1979, there was also a pastoral prayer with set wording—it was often referred to as the “prayer for the whole state of Christ’s church” from a phrase in its opening lines, and it really did cover almost every possible thing you could think to pray for.

While that prayer remains an option for those Episcopalians who want to use it today (you can read it, in the form it was preserved in the current BCP, here), the 1979 BCP added a number of more interactive and lay-led prayers in this spot, also covering a large spectrum of needs in the church and the world—including, in many cases, government officials by name.

Which is what brings me to 1 Timothy 2. Now, the names aren’t printed in the BCP—in the US we change heads of state a little bit more often than the Church of England, which was able to use prayers for the Queen for over 70 years before having to print new books with prayers for the King. But there is a spot for intercessors (those who lead the prayers) to add the names. All of the forms of prayer have a spot where general intercessions can be added, and several have an intercession specifically for government officials, such as Prayer V:

For those in positions of public trust [especially (names)], that they may serve justice, and promote the dignity and freedom of every person, we pray to you, O Lord.

Praying all these years for my leaders, in four states and through the terms of multiple presidents, has brought home to me the wisdom of Paul’s words here. (It also once produced the humorous statement that I couldn’t remember the name of the governor of Indiana because I hadn’t prayed since he’d been elected. I meant as a leader of the Prayers of the People, of course.)

Sometimes I agreed with my leaders and sometimes I did not. (You don’t have to agree with someone to pray for them, after all.) But I kept praying for them to do justice and love mercy “so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity,” and I kept remembering the other thing Paul said as well: there is one God. (Paul may be quoting an early church hymn here; the NRSV thinks so, as it has indented the statement as poetry.) Kings, we pray for. God, we serve.

Find all Life for Leaders devotions here. Explore what the Bible has to say about work at the unique website of our partners, the Theology of Work Project. Reflection on today’s Life for Leaders theme can be found here: Prayer, Peace, and Order Are Needed at Work as in Church (1 Timothy 2:1–15).