For The Second Day Of Christmas--Pray For An End To Separation Barriers

"For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility."  

(Ephesians 2:14 NIV)

Whether it be the Berlin Wall, the barrier fence on our U.S.-Mexican border, or Israel's Separation Barrier (seen here) that scars the Holy Land around Bethlehem and the West Bank, there is something in us that "doesn't love a wall", that begs to have it removed.

On the second day of Christmas, a season that for believers has just officially begun, join me in praying that these kinds of physical walls will become a thing of the past. Also that those invisible barriers dividing us along race, class, gender, religious and national lines may be removed by the Prince of Peace, or at least that doors may be opened in them to allow us all full access.

In the vision of the "New Jerusalem" in the Apocalypse (that visionary new city representing the peaceful Lamb's radiant " bride") God's eternal dwelling, established on a new and transformed earth, has secure walls but eternally open gates in all directions. "The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there is no night there." (Revelation 21 NIV)

Pray with me that the world's darkness will be dispelled and all of its walls be destroyed--or to be remade with gates that are forever open and welcoming.