Praying into 2016: a Christian prayer thread for the New Year

[Tuo]

Happy New Year friends.

This thread is a safe space where anyone - regular, occasional visitor, lurker, committed Christian or waverer - is welcome to come and leave their prayers in the knowledge that they will be prayed for. No problem is too big or small to share here, and if you just want to come and say 'hi', that's fine too.

Looking back through our previous thread, we pray in particular for:

ALittleFaith - for good treatment for her anxiety; for better understanding from her boss; for the lovely Faithlet.

amberlight - for her work supporting people with autism, and for her and her family.

Anjelica27 - for her DS, who has mental health problems, and for Anjelica and her family.

BlackEyedSusan - for all that she has to juggle as a single mum, for her DC, and for her mum. Praying for a peaceful and happy 2016.

Dontbesilly - for her dad, who has been diagnosed with cancer, and for all who love and care for him; also for the medical team looking after him; for her DH's work situation; and for Don't's DDog who has a heart condition.

DutchOma - with gratitude for all she does to support people on this thread and elsewhere. Thinking of her especially as the anniversary of the loss of her beloved Bob approaches, in particular after the recent death of her brother as well. May she know God's closeness to her in her grief.

EdithSimcox - for her to be able to find ways to support and nurture her faith; and for understanding from her DP.

FaithLoveandHope - for clarity about what she wants (and what God wants) for her future.

HardyLeodicean - especially for her FIL.

IHopeYouStepOnALegoPiece - for her to find comfort and joy in exploring her faith; also for a good recovery from heart surgery for her best friend's dad.

JugglingFromHereToThere - for her search for rewarding work, for health, and for comfort and strength for her and the rest of her family following the tragic death of her nephew.

Kaykat - following her divorce from an abusive ex; for happiness for her and for her DS.

legohurtswhenyoustandonit - for her to feel more at home and accepted by her church.

LifeofBriony - for her relationship with her DH; also for her DS going back to university after Christmas.

LightnessofBeing - for her new church, and for energy to cope with her punishing work schedule.

MadHairDay - for her health, especially in the cold, wet winter months which are always so hard on her lungs.

Pandora97 - as she starts a new job in a new town for the new year following difficult and stressful times relating to a court case in recent months.

passportmess (formerly known as QuietIsland) - for a colleague whose husband is very ill, and for a university friend who has been diagnosed with cancer.

PatchworkTurtle - for healing in her relationship.

PositiveAttitude - for her DD1, who is depressed, to get the support she needs; for her DD3 and her DH to work through their relationship issues; for PA's DH to find work that makes him happier, for PA's DMum to continue to be happy in her (relatively) new care home and for PA's DDad to cope with her being there. Above all, we pray for PA herself, who is always there for others when they need her, to be happy and fulfilled in 2016.

QoF - for courage when she is feeling anxious.

ScouseQueen - for a full recovery from recent illness.

SESthebrave - for her DH, who has been working abroad, and for SES, juggling everything at home; for her DS to find ways of communicating, rather than lashing out, when he is frustrated; and for her to feel appreciated for the work she does at her church.

TheRealGracePoole - for her ministry to women in her area.

weegiemum - giving thanks for an improvement in her DD1's (borderline) anorexia; praying for weegiemum's own health and for the Master's course which she has undertaken.

And, as always, prayers for anyone I've forgotten (with apologies), for all who lurk but don't post, for 'old-timers' who haven't posted recently, and for newbies who may not have posted yet.

A prayer of St Teresa of Avila

Let nothing disturb you.
Let nothing frighten you.
All things pass away:
God never changes.
Patience obtains all things.
Those who have God
Find they lack nothing;
God alone suffices. Amen

Oh bes, here:

finally he is asleep and we are faced with sorting the destruction he has wreaked.

Is it very bad?

he has ripped the bag of receipts for burning at mothers and scattered them along with the post on the stairs, coats bags and shoes have been thrown about. I am paying dd to pick it up, which she did not mind doing, but she should be rewarded. also worried about her as she had to stand outside the car for quite a while while the human pin ball boinged around the inside shutting all the doors. kicking and thumping. we did sit on the boot lip for a bit but he found a stick to poke us with. we did manage to sit in the car for a bit. well ddsat in the car. I layed in the car holding ds by the jumper while he tried to escape from the passenger door.

I would say

but apparently I downed a barrel of gin in the goose and carrot (over there in special needs--->>>) after Ds's melt down. I have little memory of this but a virtual headache.

off to school for ds's class presentation. been to see dd.

then it is the holidays! yay!

A virtual hangover ....

mm. no chance of a real one. which is not a bad thing.

I am either so far through tired and grumpy I have come out the other side and just don't care or some of you are praying.

ds is grumpy. we have added half chewed toast and melted cheese to the layer in the hall.

dd picked up a lot yesterday, I rushed the recycling down this morning. and I have been out all day with school and supermarket.

Hopefully you will all have a chance to calm down. You are welcome to bring him down so he can demonstrate his very best Oma behaviour. He has never been less than angelic with me.
And yes, prayer has gone up on your behalf

someone elses child messed about with the stick-like things that are attached to the side of the pews... (i think something to represent people and apostles or bishops or something) during the service with school.

I'm taking DS to the children's service as we speak. Haven't been to our church since the big incident. Don't really think we'll go again after this. Feeling a bit apprehensive.

well if it any consolation the vicars dd was doing laps of the church dressed as a superhero.

but not messing about with churchfurnishings this time

I would say the vicars elder daughter was chasing round the hall afterwards but then, I would have to dob in ds as well. they played quite well Together!

how was it Dr spouse?

It was good. Just a slightly extended Sunday School really. The nice older teacher was running it, who is pretty tolerant, but nobody asked where I'd been. DH thinks they'll only wonder if we change our standing order.

DrSpouse - glad it was ok. Do you think you'll go back or look elsewhere?

BES - how's things today?

I'm having the most unholy Easter weekend away at my SIL's hen do. I do miss not being in my parish and miss being home for Easter but it's going to be great craic, as they say over here.

Had a great conversation with DH on Thurs so thank you for your prayers. I'd asked him a few weeks back how much I'd need to earn if I was to step down and go pt. He didn't give me an answer. On Thurs, he said it was more a matter of how much I wanted to work! Looks likely I'll just be doing a couple of days a week from Sept then!
It's going to be a bit of an adjustment and I'm anxious about it but I do think it's the right thing.

I did go to another church locally with just DC2 recently, they explicitly say on their website that they LIKE to hear and see small children, and it was true, and there were 2 other under-3s in the service who were behaving exactly as DC2 was.

So we are trying there tomorrow as a family. We really want to go somewhere as a family and DH has accepted that I'm not going with the children to our usual church.

It is not very far and in fact if we drive it is probably about the same time to get there as our regular church which we walk to. Our regular church has the reputation of being the big one that everyone wants to come to from far away but the other one is smaller and a bit more of a neighbourhood church and it's not our neighbourhood, however. I'm not sure how much that will put off DH who has some quite fixed ideas (not in a bad way - usually through good motivations).

The other church sounds more like a welcoming community from what you say.

Sad not to make it to church yesterday, and haven't yet broached the subject about tomorrow. Prayers for that conversation please!

already prayed Edith. before I logged on! possibly about the time you posted.

how Am I? well I am working through things in my head. Another email reply from church which inferes that if we do not get there on time, tough luck, and that there is nothing they can do about certain stuff. I get the impression it is not important enough to bother about, despite there being a big push on the thing that I am asking for.

what the heck is this

Prayers that you can get to church tomorrow, Edith.

Praying for you, BES - praying for peace and calm (and lol at the vicar's dd in superhero outfit ) - bless. Hope that you do feel more listened to.

Praying especially for dont today and tomorrow - that through this awful time, you will somehow know the perfect peace of God who came down among us and gave himself for us.

Thinking of you all this Holy Saturday. It's always kind of an in between day, with the pain of the friday so raw and the joy of the sunday not yet dreamed of. Praying that in your in between times you will know God alongside you, walking with you, filling you, and that you will know the joy of tomorrow in your tomorrow...

I've been making easter gardens in the rain. Now I'm tired.

vicar with two superhero dd's is not the usual vicar.... tis the school vicar. It really, really cheered me up. there were a few noisy children which gave me a perspective. why was the superhero doing laps ok and some of the other not? or not handled well. (given that I have a lot of handling of difficult behaviour to negotiate) I think they put the talker off. perhaps she should have handled it differently. (I think there are things she could have done, there are thinkgs that could hvae been done. I think it would have meant deviating from the script.) parents of noisy kids left. they seemed to be a family that were not used to church. maybe this was not a good thing. how to balance the needs of different people. aggh it is so complicated. I think it was that they disturbed the parent, and the talker that was upsetting. I could feel their stress.

where to I step in with Ds. When things have been ok because church is done one way and they change it how do we negotiate the change for ds. do we go with continual low level disruption by allowing him to do behaviour that was ok but is now not due to change of format, or do we go with quite a few weeks of big scale disruption to impose the new standards of behaviour. someone decided to change stuff without thinking how it would effect all sorts of different people, we are getting the consequences of that.

in a bit of an inbetween time. church tomorrow could be difficult.

Praying for everyone who is having a hard time with their church, one way or another. I have too and am just standing back, waiting on God to tell me what to do, if anything. I think He may be saying that it is alright to feel this way and we should not run around 'doing' whatever, but that may be just me.
At the same time I think we should take time to feel God's love around us. How can we say that God loves us if we are forever trying to 'do' when all He wants us to do is to 'be'. Martha and Mary anyone?