Precious Lord and
Most high God,
You are our Refuge
And Safe Haven.
We have no good apart from You.
We depend on You for our very lives.
We trust in nothing or no one else;
We can do nothing apart from You.
Therefore we come before You
With a spirit of thanksgiving
For the many blessings You have bestowed on us.
We especially give You thanks for our veterans.
Oh how they reflect Your spirit with their unselfish sacrifice.
They follow Your example in being willing to give up their very lives
For the lives of many
That we may experience freedom and liberty.
We thank You for their bravery and courageous endurance.
We thank You for their health and protection.
We thank You for their families who endure along with them.
And we thank You for their vocation and calling.
We ask, oh God, that You may visit them, wherever they are.
So many bear the marks of their sacrifice in their physical and mental struggles.
Compassionate Savior, we ask that You hold them tight in Your hand.
Help us to care for them.
Give us the focus, the strength, the humbleness, the selflessness,
The gratitude, the willingness, the sense of duty, the thirst, and the means
To tend to their every need
And the needs of their loved ones.
Forgive us our trespasses and failure to care for them as we should.
Help us as a nation to honor their sacrifice with a sense of duty
And that genuine love You have showed to us.
Help us, we pray, to never forget their sacrifice, oh gracious Father.
Help us to consider them as better than ourselves, as You commanded in Your Word.
Help us to love service and charity more than our selfish desires.
Give us Your powerful, life-giving, peace-spreading,
Contagious joy as we serve our veterans.
That Your Name may be glorified
Now and forever more.
Amen.