Lord Jesus Christ, Teach Us to See

Daily Office Reflection — Sunday, October 25, 2026
Psalms 8, 24, 29, 84; Sirach 36:1–17; 1 Corinthians 12:27–13:13; Matthew 18:21–35

This morning, I find myself praying a simple prayer:

Lord Jesus Christ, teach us to see what you see and offer what you offer: compassion, forgiveness, and restoration.

As we approach an election, so many voices compete for our attention. Accusations fill our conversations. We are urged to be afraid, to be angry, to believe that our neighbors are our enemies.

I feel the pull of it myself. I want to know what is true. I worry about our country and the people who are struggling within it. And I have to ask: What is all this doing to my heart?

Today’s readings invite me to pause, seek God, and examine how I am seeing.

Psalm 8 places us beneath the vastness of the heavens. Looking at the moon and stars, the psalmist wonders why God would be mindful of us at all. Yet God crowns human beings with glory and honor.

That dignity belongs to the neighbor I understand and the stranger I do not. It belongs to the person without a home, the immigrant seeking safety, the person carrying a difficult past, and the person whose political convictions differ from mine.

Before I attach a label, there is a human being whom God regards with care.

Psalm 24 widens the view: the earth and everything in it belong to the Lord. We live here as people entrusted with something precious. How we care for the land and for one another matters.

The psalm asks about clean hands and a pure heart. I hear that as a question directed toward me. Are my actions honest? What am I allowing to take root within me? Can I ask God to expose deception while remaining willing to recognize it in myself?

Psalm 29 moves through the power and turmoil of a storm, then ends with the blessing of peace. I need that reminder when the noise becomes overwhelming. I need strength to remain present and faithful without allowing anger to govern my life.

Then Psalm 84 gives us the person content to stand at the doorway of God’s house.

I think about that doorway. A humble place. A place where someone might welcome a stranger, notice a tired face, or make room for a person who wonders whether they belong.

There is meaningful work to do at the door.

In Sirach, I hear the cry: “Have mercy, O Lord, on the people called by your name.”

That has become my prayer for our world and especially for the country where I live.

Sometimes we say that we need to return to God. But I hesitate over the suggestion that our past was a time of uncomplicated faithfulness. Slavery and the dispossession of Native peoples are part of our history. So are the lives of people who resisted injustice and worked for healing.

We need enough honesty to face the wounds and enough courage to continue the work of repair.

Have mercy on us, O God. Lead us into the faithfulness we have so often proclaimed and struggled to practice.

Paul brings this prayer close to home. After speaking about the gifts of the church, he promises to show us a more excellent way.

That way is love.

He describes patience and kindness, humility and truthfulness. These are qualities I must practice when I speak, when I disagree, when I share something online, and when I decide how to respond to another person’s need.

Paul also says something I need to remember: “Now I know only in part.”

Even Paul acknowledges the limits of his understanding. Surely I can acknowledge mine.

I can hold convictions and still listen. I can examine an accusation before passing it along. I can admit that another person’s experience may reveal something I have failed to see.

I do not have to understand everything before I take the next loving step.

In Matthew, Jesus tells of a servant released from an enormous debt who then refuses mercy to someone indebted to him. He receives a future he could never have secured for himself, then closes the door on another person.

That troubles me.

How easily can we receive grace and still withhold compassion? How easily can we pray for help while dismissing someone else who needs it?

Forgiveness does not erase harm or remove the need for accountability. Trust may need to be rebuilt. Boundaries may need to remain. Yet mercy asks us to leave room for repentance, change, and a future beyond someone’s worst moment.

These readings give me questions to carry into the days ahead.

Am I seeing people, or only labels?

Am I seeking truth, or simply looking for something that confirms my anger?

Who might be hurt by the choices I support?

What can I do to help restore dignity, safety, and hope?

I want these questions to accompany my vote. I also want them to accompany me into work, into church, into conversations, and into the ordinary decisions that shape a life.

The healing we pray for requires our participation.

So today, I begin here:

Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us.

Teach us to see with compassion, listen with wisdom, speak with love, and discern what is true and loving.

Protect those who are vulnerable. Restrain cruelty. Bring wrongdoing into the light. Give those entrusted with power the wisdom and humility to serve.

Forgive us when our desire to win overwhelms our willingness to love. Help us face our history honestly and respond to the suffering before us.

Teach us to offer compassion that draws near, forgiveness that opens a future, and restoration that repairs what has been broken.

Guide our words, our choices, and our votes.

Heal our land, and show each of us the next faithful thing to do.

Amen.

—The Curious Pilgrim