Prayer for the Day: The Second Day after Pentecost

Be gentle with us today
because we have been misplaced.
Somewhere beyond the action,
    after your climactic death and return,
    after your final words to us,
    after the winds of Pentecost,
    after the sermons and the baptisms,
We find ourselves outside of your story and inside our own
    made frail again by our loneliness,
    disoriented by your absence,
    overwhelmed by the work ahead.
You've shoved us out of the narrative
    and begged us to find it again
    because the loose strands dangle about our lives
    and, perhaps, no longer out of reach.

We know why it must be this way.
Only, have mercy on us.