Intercessory prayer changes us as much as it does the person or persons for whom we are praying. As we lift up each name before God, we are somehow lifted up to God as well. We carry the messiness and the murkiness of our own lives, and our hope for ourselves and others in the midst of that messiness and murkiness into the life and light of God. And God listens. And God cares. And God acts. And often, God weeps.