If you’re ever wanting to pray for our country’s leaders but not sure what to say, consider this.

This was found in my inbox the other day. It is supposedly a prayer given by “minister” Joe Wright before the opening of the Kansas Senate in 1996. I keep getting it from various sources and suppose you may have seen it already.

Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask Your forgiveness and to seek Your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, "Woe to those who call evil good,," but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values.

We confess:

We have ridiculed the absolute truth of Your Word and called it Pluralism.

We have worshipped other gods and called it multiculturalism.

We have endorsed perversion and called it alternative lifestyle.

We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery.

We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.

We have killed our unborn and called it choice.

We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable.

We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self-esteem.

We have abused power and called it politics.

We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.

We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression.

We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment.

Search us, Oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free.

Guide and bless these men and women who have been sent to direct us to the center of your will. I ask it in the Name of Your Son, the living Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

The email goes on to claim that a number of legislators walked out during the prayer in protest. In six short weeks, Central Christian Church, where Rev. Wright is pastor, logged more than 5,000 phone calls with only 47 of those calls responding negatively. The church is now receiving international requests for copies of this prayer from India, Africa, and Korea. Also, commentator Paul Harvey aired this prayer on "The Rest of the Story" on the radio and received a larger response to this program than any other he has ever aired.

Uh huh. Like I said, I get this and things like it all the time. A quick check online, such as at UrbanLegends.com, usually dispels them with quick dispatch as someone’s wishful thinking. However, much to my surprise the above is actually true, for the most part! In fact the full record is yet more interesting – those politicians who criticized the prayer were the ones who were in turn protested against by the public!

It’s a good reminder to me that while we may differ with others on doctrine, that doesn’t mean they don’t “get it” when they read their bibles! As Mike often says on the TV show, it’s not OUR opinions that count, only the word that matters. In this era where one of the current presidential candidates claimed Job was their favorite book but was then unable to remember if it was found in the new or old testament, I think we’ve surely gotten rather far from a country founded, in part, on a belief and trust in God.

Randy