Prayers for Peace
People come looking for peace from two directions. Some want the noise inside their own head to stop. Others are watching the news, or watching a family come apart, and want it to stop out there. Both are on this page, and the short prayers are first, because peace is usually wanted urgently.
Lord, quiet me.
Take the noise out of my head and the knot out of my chest.
Put your peace where the worry is,
and hold it there. Amen.
Twenty seconds. Nine more short prayers are directly below.
On this pageShort Prayers Peace of Heart and Mind Peace at Home Peace Between People World Peace Bible Verses About Peace What the Bible Means by Peace Questions Browse All Prayers
Short Prayers for Peace
Ten prayers short enough to say from memory, in the car, in a corridor, at three in the morning.
Lord, give me peace for the next ten minutes.
Not answers. Just peace. Amen.
Father, be near me in this.
Comfort what cannot be fixed today,
and give me peace enough to sleep tonight. Amen.
Lord, steady me and strengthen me.
Let me be calm on the inside and useful on the outside.
Carry what I cannot. Amen.
Father, my thoughts will not settle.
Take the ones that are not true.
Keep the ones that are. Amen.
Lord, I am not asking you to change it yet.
I am asking for peace inside it.
Meet me here. Amen.
Lord, make peace between us.
Soften what is hard in them and what is hard in me.
Show me the first move. Amen.
Father, let this be a peaceful home.
Quiet the arguing, the slamming, the silence that is worse than arguing.
Let your peace live here. Amen.
Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.
Isaiah 26:3, one line, and the whole condition is in the word “stayed”: peace follows attention, not the other way round.
Lord of peace, give peace where there is none.
Stop what should be stopped.
Protect the people who cannot protect themselves. Amen.
Lord, give me peace.
If it is worry rather than circumstance, see our prayers for peace of mind and prayers for anxiety.
Prayers for Peace of Heart and Mind
Father, I have been carrying this on my own and it has cost me.
I am handing it over, and I know I will pick it back up by lunchtime.
When I do, take it again.
Let your peace, the kind that makes no sense from the outside, stand guard over my heart and my mind today.
Not because the situation has changed, but because you have not. Amen.
Lord, my mind is running and I cannot slow it.
Give me one thing to hold onto and let the rest wait until morning.
You are awake anyway. Take the night shift. Amen.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference. Amen.
Written by Reinhold Niebuhr in the 1930s and adopted by Alcoholics Anonymous, which is how it reached the world. The longer version is here.
Lord, I have prayed for peace and I still do not feel it.
I am telling you rather than pretending.
Stay with me in the meantime, and let me sleep. Amen.
More at our prayers for comfort, prayers for sleep and prayers for fear.
Prayers for Peace at Home
Lord, let this house be a peaceful place.
Guard the doors and the tempers.
Let the people who live here be gentle with each other,
and let anyone who walks in feel the difference. Amen.
Father, we are wearing each other down.
Take the sharp edges off what we say.
Give one of us the grace to go first. Amen.
Lord, whatever went wrong today, let it end here.
No grudges carried up the stairs.
Give this household a quiet night. Amen.
Lord Jesus, quiet this child.
Take the fear out of the dark and the noise out of their head.
Let them sleep, and let them wake up glad. Amen.
More at our prayers for family, prayers for marriage and prayers for children.
Prayers for Peace Between People
The hardest peace to pray for is the kind that requires you to do something.
Lord, there is someone I am not at peace with, and you know their name.
Change what needs to change in them.
Change what needs to change in me first.
If it is possible, as far as it depends on me, let there be peace between us. Amen.
Father, I do not want to and I am asking anyway.
Take the bitterness before it sets.
I release them, and I will need to do it again tomorrow. Amen.
Lord, I have tried and they are not ready.
Keep me from bitterness and from giving up on them.
Hold the door open on my side. Amen.
Lord, go into this room ahead of me.
Give me plain words and a soft tone.
Let me listen longer than I speak. Amen.
More at our prayers for forgiveness, prayers for anger and prayers to love others.
Prayers for World Peace
Lord of peace, we are asking for the thing that looks impossible.
Stop the wars that are running tonight.
Protect the children, the old, the ones with nowhere to go.
Give courage to the people negotiating and shame to the people profiting.
Where we cannot see a way, make one. Amen.
Lord, give peace in our time.
An ancient line from the daily prayer of the Church, said for well over a thousand years by people who were also living through wars.
Father, be with the people of every place where the shooting has not stopped.
Shelter them tonight.
Bring the fighting to an end sooner than anyone expects. Amen.
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy. Amen.
The best known peace prayer in the world, and Francis of Assisi did not write it. It first appeared anonymously in a French devotional magazine in 1912, seven hundred years after he died. The full text and the story are here.
Bible Verses About Peace
The passages Christians pray when they want peace, grouped by what they are actually for.
Peace of mind
Peace with other people
Peace as something you make
Peace as a blessing given
What the Bible Means by Peace
Four things worth knowing, because the ordinary English word is doing a poor job of translating what is actually being promised.
Peace is not the absence of trouble
The Hebrew word is shalom, and it does not mean quiet. It means whole, complete, nothing missing, everything in its right place. When an ancient Israelite asked after your shalom he was asking whether your life was intact, not whether it was peaceful.
That changes what you are asking for. Praying for peace is not asking for the trouble to stop. It is asking for the pieces to be put back where they belong, which can be a noisy, disruptive process. Plenty of people have received exactly that and would not have described the year as peaceful.
“The peace of God shall keep your hearts” is a military image
Philippians 4:7 is the verse most people reach for, and the word translated “keep” is phroureo, which is what a garrison does. It means to stand guard, to post a sentry, to hold a position. Paul wrote it from prison to a city full of Roman soldiers, and his readers would have heard the barracks in it.
So the promise is not that you will feel calm. It is that something is posted at the door of your mind while you are under pressure. That is why the verse says the peace comes after you have handed the request over, and why it says it passes understanding. You are not supposed to be able to account for it.
Jesus was specific that his peace is a different thing
“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you.” He drew the distinction himself, and he said it on the night he was betrayed, a few hours before the worst night of his life, to men who were about to scatter. It was not a serene setting and it was not a promise of one.
And the line nobody quotes
The same teacher said “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword,” and then talked about families divided. It sits awkwardly next to “blessed are the peacemakers”, and it is meant to.
The resolution is not complicated. Peace with God sometimes costs you peace with people, and Jesus refused to pretend otherwise. What he never does is tell you to go looking for the fight. Notice that the beatitude blesses peacemakers, not peace-lovers and not peacekeepers. Making peace is active and it usually costs the person making it.
Questions About Prayers for Peace
What is a short prayer for peace?
“Lord, quiet me. Take the noise out of my head and the knot out of my chest. Put your peace where the worry is, and hold it there. Amen.” If that is too long, “Lord, give me peace” is a complete prayer.
What is the most powerful prayer for peace?
Philippians 4:6-7 prayed as a request is the one Christians use most: hand over the specific thing, with thanks, and ask for the peace that passes understanding to guard your heart and mind. For peace between people, the Prayer of Saint Francis. For the world, the old line “give peace in our time”. Power in prayer is not in the wording, it is in who is listening.
What is the best Bible verse for peace?
Isaiah 26:3 for peace of mind, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.” John 14:27 when you need to be told the peace on offer is a different kind from the world’s. Philippians 4:6-7 when you have something specific to hand over. All three are above on this page.
How do you pray for world peace?
Specifically. Name the war, name the city, ask for the fighting to stop and for the people negotiating to succeed. Vague prayer for “peace in the world” is hard to keep praying because you can never see it answered. Christians have prayed “give peace in our time” daily for more than a thousand years, through most of the wars in that period, and kept praying it.
What does the Bible say about peace?
More than the English word suggests. The Hebrew shalom means wholeness rather than quiet, so biblical peace is about things being put right rather than nothing happening. Scripture treats peace as three things at once: something God gives (Numbers 6:26), something you pursue with other people (Romans 12:18), and something you make at your own cost (Matthew 5:9).
Why do I still not feel peaceful after praying?
Because the peace promised in Philippians 4:7 is described as a guard posted around you, not as a feeling you can check for. Feelings usually follow, but slowly, and not on demand. Keep praying it, and do the ordinary things too: sleep, tell someone, and see a doctor if the unease is constant rather than tied to a situation.
Is there a Catholic prayer for peace?
Several. The Prayer of Saint Francis is the most used, along with “give peace in our time” from the daily prayer of the Church, and the Rosary is prayed for peace more than for anything else. Our guide to the Rosary covers how.
What is the difference between peace and peace of mind?
On this page, peace is the wider thing: peace with God, peace between people, peace in a country. Peace of mind is the internal half of it, the quiet when worry stops running the show. If that is what you came for, our prayers for peace of mind are written for it.
What can I pray for peace before sleep?
Psalm 4:8 is the traditional one: “I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.” Add a line handing tomorrow to God, since most night-time worry is about a day that has not happened yet.
Send a Prayer to Jerusalem
If there is a situation you are asking God to bring peace to, a family, a country, or your own head, you can have that prayer taken to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial and resurrection. A priest prays it there in English, the printed prayer is placed inside one of the chapels in the church, and a candle is lit for you. You receive photographs of both by email within a few days. A portion of every order is donated to the church.
Send your prayer to Jerusalem. Write it from the heart. It is placed and photographed once, so make it count.
More Prayers for Every Situation
Quiet and Calm
Peace With People
Strength and Hope
Or browse the full prayer library.
In just a few days, you will receive photos by email of your printed prayer placed inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. This is the sacred site of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial, and resurrection.
