A Prayer for Mercy and Restoration
1 Remember, Lord, what has happened to us.
Look, and see our disgrace.
2 Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers,
our houses to foreigners.
3 We are orphans and fatherless.
Our mothers are like widows.
4 We pay money for the water we drink.
Our wood is sold to us.
5 Our pursuers are at our necks.
We are weary and have no rest.
6 We have shaken hands in submission
to the Egyptians and Assyrians,
to be satisfied with bread.
7 Our fathers sinned, and are no longer.
We have borne their iniquities.
8 Servants rule over us.
There is no one to deliver us out of their hand.
9 We get our bread at the risk of our lives,
because of the sword of the wilderness.
10 Our skin is black like an oven,
because of the burning heat of famine.
11 They ravished the women in Zion,
the virgins in the cities of Judah.
12 Princes were hanged up by their hands.
The elders were dishonored.
13 The young men carry millstones.
The children stumbled under loads of wood.
14 The elders have ceased from their place at the city gate,
and the young men from their music.
15 The joy of our heart has ceased.
Our dancing has turned into mourning.
16 The crown has fallen from our head.
Woe to us, for we have sinned!
17 For this our heart is faint.
For these things our eyes grow dim.
18 For the mountain of Zion is desolate,
and foxes roam on it.
19 You, Lord, remain forever.
Your throne is from generation to generation.
20 Why do you forget us forever
and forsake us for such a long time?
21 Turn us to yourself, Lord, and we will be restored.
Renew us like the days of old,
22 unless you have utterly rejected us,
and your anger is against us.