Illutration by Julianna Brion

On Monday mornings, the In Trust Center’s staff gathers to meet and pray for theological schools and those that support them. Each week, the team discusses a group of institutions and their work, and then names them in prayer. Here’s the prayer currently used:

Dear God:

We come to you with thanksgiving and praise for the work we have, and we praise you that you have placed us in such a time as this – one that requires creativity, curiosity, and strength to navigate the changes in the field.

Today, we look to you and ask for your help. Provide us with clear heads and clean hearts that we may faithfully carry out the mission that you have given us. We ask for your wisdom – for us and all those in the field – so that we may work in a way that will give you the greatest glory and keep the mission of our organizations in line with your will.

We pray for your blessing on all theological schools, their boards, leadership, faculty, staff, students, donors, and supporters as they look to fulfill the mission you have given them. Let their time and resources be blessed exponentially and show them the future you have for them.

We ask for wisdom so that we may work in a way that will give you the greatest glory and keep the mission of our organizations in line with your will.

Today, particularly, we pray for these specific schools.

Please bless those others who support theological schools – the ecology group, the nonprofits, the societies, the funders, particularly Lilly Endowment Inc., and others – and encourage all of us in the work before us.

We pray for our world and the turmoil within it, and we pray for our schools that they would prepare people to minister to it. We also pray specifically for the intentions we have stated.

And, we pray silently for those intentions in our hearts.

Thank you for the privilege and calling to serve you in this field. May you be glorified in all that we do.

Amen.