Wednesday Prayer: Welcoming the Stranger

Welcoming the stranger puts oneself and one’s community at risk. At best, the stranger is disruptive, bringing strange ideas and new, even wrong, ways of doing things. At worst, the stranger is dangerous, bringing disease, dishonor or violence. Welcoming the stranger is risky: everyone will be changed, host and guest alike…. And we cannot know ahead of time what the changes will be.

Amy Oden
Source: God's Welcome: Hospitality for a Gospel-Hungry World

God,

Help us remember times when we have been the stranger

how that feels

Help us to revive that feeling for ourselves again and again

that we may not be complacent, but alert, aware

that our joy may be full in each other 

and in you

Amen