Healing for Patients and Caregivers

O GOD of infinite mercy, who hast compassion upon all men and hatest nothing Thou hast made, we praise and magnify Thy glorious name for all the goodness Thou hast vouchsafed to us. Thou hast given us this wonderful life, with its strange secrets, its perplexing mysteries, its boundless aspirations, its limitless capacities for joy and sorrow. Thou hast sent us success and happiness; we have taken them as our due, and have scarce given Thee a thought. Thou hast permitted griefs and pains to befall us that Thou mightest draw us to Thyself; but we have murmured against the wholesome discipline, and have missed its saving message. Thou hast held up before us ideals of peace and holiness — not engraven on awful tables of stone but revealed in the grace and beauty of the Man Christ Jesus — yet have we turned to lower levels and made compromise with the evil of the world. In Thy mercy, forgive us all that is past, and for the future bow our wills in obedience to Thine, that we may love Thee perfectly, and serve Thee faithfully.

Loving Father! though Thou countest the stars and bringest forth their host, yet dost Thou bind up the wounds of the sick and healest the broken-hearted. If to any of us Thou hast especially spoken words of comfort and of strength, we thank Thee. If Thou hast saved any from temptation, or answered the cry of a perplexed soul, or opened a way back to Heaven and holiness for some poor prodigal child of Thine, we praise Thee. If Thou hast touched any heart with a special joy, or hast turned for any life the shadow of death into Thy morning, we give thanks to Thee for Thy great glory. By the memory of all the outgoings of thy compassion, we would vow ourselves afresh to Thee, and to the work Thou hast given us to do.

We pray for all men. We pray for those who cannot pray for themselves, who think of Thee only as a vague and puzzling image of the mind. Teach them how real, how gracious, how generous Thou art, the Source of life and light, without whom we were lost in death and darkness. We pray for the sick in the homes and hospitals of our land. Bless watched and watcher alike, that to the watched may come, even amid bodily pain and trial, strength of mind, calm of soul, and to the watcher, the sympathy and tenderness that bring Thy message of hope. We ask for no miracle, no violation of the laws Thou hast ordained, but we seek that through Thy appointed channels Thou wouldest send forth Thy word and heal the afflicted, so that men might praise Thee for Thy loving kindness and for Thy wonderful works to the children of men. Each heart knows its own bitterness, but Thou knowest the bitterness of all hearts. Thou hast a healing balm for each hurt of the soul. Bring strength to the weary, relief to the nervous and the miserable, consolation to the disconsolate, and deliverance to those who sit in the shadow of death, fast bound in misery and iron. Speak peace to the troubled conscience; strengthen the weak; confirm the strong; save the oppressed and him that hath no helper. And, by Thy mercy, bring us all by the paths of righteousness and the waters of comfort to Thine abode of rest and glory, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.