Proper 28
Worship
Lectionary Worship Aids
Series VI, Cycle A
Object:
Words Of Assurance
The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Amen.
Pastoral Prayer
O Lord, our God, who judges all things, and whose love is like a consuming fire, may our approach to you ever be filled with awe and wonder. May our hearts hunger and thirst toward a holiness and justice which is angered by all that would threaten, demean, or diminish your creation. Your fierce love has shown forth to us in Jesus Christ. Transform us daily to be like him. Give us love enough to speak the truth, and concern enough not to be conformed to the world to which we are called to be agents of change.
We come before you asking you to release our tight hold on our own lives that we might be held by you. Enter our lives with your Spirit. Where our defenses are hardened, break us. Shatter the false gods we have placed before you, exposing them as the lifeless, helpless idols they are. Destroy our anxiety over career and family. Release our grasp on things; and work the hardest work of all: open our hold on ourselves that we might no longer be constricted by our pettiness, but might be available to your will and filled by your overwhelming Presence.
We pray for the mind of Jesus. May our judgments be like his. May we live in his passions, prayers, and loves. We pray for the privilege of being ambassadors for Christ and bridges to a wounded world. Never let us forget the wounds we carry, nor the imperfections with which we speak. Give us compassion for the needy, and indignation where justice does not prevail. May we be links in the chain which binds men and women to your love. All this we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
Benediction
May the comfort of God's presence, the instruction of his Word, and the power of his Spirit, be with you all your days. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Amen.
Pastoral Prayer
O Lord, our God, who judges all things, and whose love is like a consuming fire, may our approach to you ever be filled with awe and wonder. May our hearts hunger and thirst toward a holiness and justice which is angered by all that would threaten, demean, or diminish your creation. Your fierce love has shown forth to us in Jesus Christ. Transform us daily to be like him. Give us love enough to speak the truth, and concern enough not to be conformed to the world to which we are called to be agents of change.
We come before you asking you to release our tight hold on our own lives that we might be held by you. Enter our lives with your Spirit. Where our defenses are hardened, break us. Shatter the false gods we have placed before you, exposing them as the lifeless, helpless idols they are. Destroy our anxiety over career and family. Release our grasp on things; and work the hardest work of all: open our hold on ourselves that we might no longer be constricted by our pettiness, but might be available to your will and filled by your overwhelming Presence.
We pray for the mind of Jesus. May our judgments be like his. May we live in his passions, prayers, and loves. We pray for the privilege of being ambassadors for Christ and bridges to a wounded world. Never let us forget the wounds we carry, nor the imperfections with which we speak. Give us compassion for the needy, and indignation where justice does not prevail. May we be links in the chain which binds men and women to your love. All this we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
Benediction
May the comfort of God's presence, the instruction of his Word, and the power of his Spirit, be with you all your days. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
