by Linda Sappington
Sovereign Lord, we come before you in hope. We hear the cries of our neighbors who are being detained by Immigration and Custom Enforcement officials. In these instances, we don’t see people treasuring one another. We don’t see connections of respect between people. We are seeing brutality and violence, despair and weeping.
We have hearts and hands to place in Your service, particularly in regard to these detention activities. We ask for Your guidance and wisdom for our actions and for the actions of elected officials. Please use us all to stop this bullying, especially as it threatens to come to our homes via a purchased local warehouse that may become a detention center.
Open the eyes of local planners to see the true cost of this detention building and use strategy. If dollars and cents are the only accepted measurement, raise up individuals who can monetize spiritual, environmental, social, and emotional harm so that these costs can enter into the decision makers’ equations.
Please help us to love everyone creatively:
- The individuals and families whose permission to live in the US has ended.They need alternative places to live, extended permission to live in the US, and/or changed attitudes toward their full people empowering participation in the community life of any country.
- The ICE officials who were hired by civic authorities to perform a job to the best of their ability.
- The community resource people – police, rescue workers, medical personnel whose jobs may expand to include the needs of those in the facility.
- Environmental support people – water, sewer, electric power support personnel whose responsibility to steward the land will expand in the face of facility needs.
- The people who live in the community where the detention facility resides.Their lives will be impacted by the expansion of their community.
We have lifetimes of walking with You. We don’t want to accidentally leave You or walk ahead of You. As you delivered the Israelites from Egypt, deliver everyone from this particular legalized horror. Help officials find respectful alternatives to this detention policy.
In Jesus’ powerful name and invitation to speak with You, Amen.
