Lift up family members grieving.
Lift up military personnel who have lost comrades.
Lift up military and civilian leaders who make difficult commands.
Lift up communities hurting from the absence of young men and women.

We too lift up those civilians killed in conflict.
Too many die unintentionally in the fog of war.
Too many die at the hands of those who do not value human life.
Lift up the families and communities where civilians have died.

War is a failure of human imagination even under the most just of reasons.
War is contrary to what we understand your will to be.
Help us lift up a vision of a just peace for the world.
Help us to lift up a vision of Shalom in broken places.

Let us beat our swords into ploughshares,
Our spears into pruning-hooks;
let nation not lift up sword against nation,
let all the people of Earth learn peace over war. (Isaiah 2:4)

In memory of those who have laid down their lives for us, we pray.

Amen.

- Rev. Dr. Chuck Currie