A Prayer for Our City
A Prayer for Our City
Offered by Dr. Dock Hollingsworth | Senior Pastor
Our senior pastor Dr. Dock Hollingsworth was asked to offer a prayer for Atlanta during Mayor Andre Dickens State of the City address. Read his words below and remember our beloved community in your own times of prayer.
Holy God, Who has carried us from the days of the Phoenix to this good day, we offer back our gratitude. We give thanks that in March of 2024 we live in this city, under the leadership of this mayor and in the bustle and vibrancy of all that Atlanta offers. It is a good day to live and work and play in Atlanta … we gather in gratitude and celebration.
And yet, we confess that we have work to do. In a city once billed as a City Too Busy to Hate, we’ve seen some ugly signs of new growth. Racial tensions simmer. Some of Your children still sleep under bridges because we have not cared enough. Political partisans are plotting new ways to smear and hurt neighbors who vote differently. Antisemitic hate is growing more frequent and more intense. Too many kids are hungry when they get on the school bus. Forgive us for failing to repair what is ours to do. We have not lived into the fullness of Your hope for us. So, impress on us new ways that we can come together to heal, in Your Name, what hurts us. We don’t need to be too busy to hate, we need to be healed of our selfishness and bound in community. We need to be redeemed of our hate. May it be so.
On this day, gathered in this one room, is all the answer we need if only we might hear and heed Your call to care and to do. In this room, we represent corporate wealth, city decision makers and leadership that has changed the Atlanta skyline. In Your grace and guidance, we can change things again. Call our diversity together to bigger dreams, more compassionate systems and a unified citizenry.
We offer thanks for our mayor and pray You will continue to bless him with wise judgement, strength for the task and compassionate vision. We give thanks that he has led us to not only build technology but also At-Promise Youth Centers ... That he doesn’t just repair potholes, but is trying to repair a housing crisis. Bless his compassionate vision for our city and give us the courage to join him in all efforts that build us up.
Bless this city with healing and hope. Bless Atlanta with a moral clarity that is as tall as her skyline. Bless us with generosity and compassion. Our Atlanta ancestors envisioned a beloved community. So, bless us with vibrancy and vision. Bless us with unified diversity. Bless the City of Atlanta with abundant measures of Your grace so that we might soon realize that beloved community that our ancestors prayed for us.
Lord, hear our prayer. Amen.