How to pray for peace.

One doesn’t merely pray for peace in the abstract. One prays for those who are empowered to bring about conditions leading to peace. Peace does not just happen. It happens because of the commitment of others. So even one whose life is devoted to prayer prays for the actions that bring about the intended results.

There is room for prayer and there is room for action. There is room for listening. There is room for commitment. In some situations, prayer is what is specifically needed. In other situations, it is the actions toward which the prayer is directed that are so central. If you pray for insight, for an understanding of the meaning of and the potential held within an encounter, you will do what is right. There is no doubt. You may not see its benefit, and your efforts may be greeted with rejection, as you interpret it. But your efforts are never in vain, for what is rejection but a response that is different from what you expected or hoped or intended? You have no idea what your impact on others is. The responses you get are not the end of the energy. They’re just the first wave of that energy. There is much that lies beyond what you know of another.