Lord,

I come to you now, on my knees.  I know you do not always do things the way I want you to.  Your ways are not my ways.  My life has taught me you are always working on many levels which I cannot see.  Things appear one way, only for me to find later they are not what they seem.  Help me to trust you in this season. 

I see you are exposing hearts and it is not pretty.  I know my own heart has shadows within it.  Only your light can bring healing.  Give me the courage to let you shine it in the shadows.  Make me brave in the midst of the overwhelming darkness of our world.  Open my eyes to see that you are still working.  All is not lost, in fact, you are closer now than ever before. Help me to see that as the dark gets darker, the light gets even brighter.

In traveling the world, I have learned to look for you everywhere and always.  When I seek you, I find you.  My small view shows me how much bigger you are than the silly molehills I make into mountains.  You are enormous; beyond my comprehension.  I am like the grass that will fade away tomorrow.  I live on a small dot of a planet, hanging in the universe you created.  Why do I worry?  Why do I fret over something as small as an election? It is because I do not understand what trusting you looks like. 

Give me the ability to open my hand.  Even when things look unclear.  Even when they are unprecedented.  Grasping for control is the opposite of trust.  The more I grasp, the further I am from allowing you to work.  The more I want things to go my way, the more I limit what you can do.  I long for unity and peace, for some sort of normal, but sometimes it is fire that purifies. 

I am on my knees.  I bow down to ask you to heal my heart and my country.  I humble myself and lay down my pride in order to find the freedom you give.  Not the man-made kind.  Not the kind written on parchment and paper, but the kind you have written on my heart.  The deep truth which already resides within me, that you are steadfast and trustworthy. That you are faithful even when I forget, in the clamor and noise of the day.

I hear the whisper of your still small voice, asking me “What are you doing here? In the fear, in the dismay, in the anxiety.  I am not in the wind, I am not in the earthquake, I am not in the fire.  I am not in the pandemic, I am not in the riots, I am not in the storms. I am not in the election. I am in the still small voice that says ‘This is the way, walk in it.’  I am the way.  I long to be gracious to you and to show you compassion.  Wait for me.  Cry for help and I will answer you. Trust me.  I hear your cries.  The bread of adversity is on your table.  The water of affliction is in your cup.  They are your teachers and you will listen.  To the right or the left, they will guide you each step.  My ways are not your ways.  The choice to trust or not is at hand.  What will you choose?”

I choose trust.  I choose your sovereignty.  I choose to allow you to work through whoever you will.  Governments rise and fall by your hand.  You knew the outcome of this election before the first vote was cast. You move the hearts of men, just as you expose them.  You long to show me compassion and to free me from the bondages in which I put myself.  Free me from my small viewpoint. Unshackle me.  Set me free from the man-made freedoms and show me true freedom, which only you provide.  Freedom of heart.  Freedom of spirit.  Freedom, no matter what man is in charge…because in reality you are in control and you alone are my freedom.

I pray you will give all our leaders a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you.  Open the eyes of their hearts so they will know the hope to which you have called them and the riches of your glorious inheritance, the immeasurable greatness of YOUR power towards us.  Give them vision according to your great might, not the small might of a country…but your might which you worked through Christ when he was raised from the dead and seated with you in heavenly places…who is above all rule and authority and power and dominion of men.  He is the one who is above every name and who has all things under his feet and who is head of all things…even elections. 

I give it all to you.  I lay it at your feet.  I release my grasp and I leave the results in your hand.  I trust your heart for me is love and the outcome of the election will lead me to seek it, one way or another. 

Thanks be to you, Jesus, for your sacrifice for us all.  All the red.  All the blue.  All the black.  All the white.  ALL.  I pray for the truth of your sacrifice to be heard far and wide.  Yes. Freedom from… death and sin.  But more importantly, freedom to… life and love.  I vote for from and to. 

In your name, Amen.