Pastoral Prayer (P.M.) - 13 April 2014

Blessed are you, O Lord our God, who chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before you. In love you predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of your will, to the praise of your glorious grace, with which you have blessed us in the Beloved (Ephesians 1.4-6). Almighty and eternal God, the strength of those who believe and the hope of those who find their faith watery-thin; fortify our hearts to have toughened, intensified trust in you, that through whatever trials we must wade we may believe and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of our faith, the salvation of our souls (1 Peter 1.8-9). O Lord, hear our prayer.

 LORD God who rescued your people from the enslaving taskmaster, liberating our forbearers from the house of bondage, having triumphed gloriously: we pray for those who are trapped by their cravings, predilections, and passions …show them the power you worked when you raised your Son from the grips of death; set them thoroughly free, and transform them through-and-through. O Lord, hear our prayer.

 O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all who have gone astray from your ways – or those may be on the verge of doing so …, and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of your Word, Jesus Christ your Son, and the ordinarily essential fellowship of your Church (adapted from the Book of Common Prayer- 1979). O Lord, hear our prayer.

 We pray on behalf of your Church world-over; this congregation; True Disciples Church; United Life Church; United Tribe for Christ Fellowship; Unity Baptist Church; Victory Church of Edmond; all of the congregations of the Christian Reformed Church; United Reformed Church of North America; and those affiliated with the National Association of Evangelicals. Spur your people on to love and good works. And since you resist the proud and give grace to the humble; may we submit to you and resist the Devil – for you promise he will flee from us; may we draw near to you for you promise to draw near to us; and may we humble ourselves in your sight, for you promise to exalt those who do so (James 4.6-10). O Lord, hear our prayer.

 Holy God, who gives and maintains health and wholeness, when we would crumble under the pressure of our disintegrating world and deteriorating frames: Restore the bodies, dreams, hopes, and minds of those who are diseased, desperate, disconsolate or disturbed [especially those tackling and being tackled by Depression, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, MS, Cancer, Bipolar issues, Aging concerns, debilitating migraines, etc] … O Lord, hear our prayer.

 As your Spirit hovered over creation that was tohu v’bohu – formless and void, setting creation in order: may he hover over our world – all of the nations, regions, and tribes – and may he strongly bring about peace, justice and order. O Lord, hear our prayer.
All of these prayers we offer through Your Son, Jesus Christ, as we now sing: Hear our prayer, O Lord;
hear our prayer, O Lord.
Incline Thine ear to us,
and grant us Thy peace (TH # 728).

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?" (Rev. Ed.) by John Fea. A Review

Image
  John Fea is a professor of history at Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, PA. A university founded in 1909 by the Brethren in Christ Church. He originally published "Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? A Historical Introduction" in 2011, and it was revised in 2016. This 328-page paperback is packed full with Colonial and American history, drawing from original sources to answer that question. It is a book written "for the historically minded and thoughtful reader who is looking for help in sorting" out this question, avoiding polemics (xix). Since we live in a sound-bite culture, Fea recognizes that it is difficult to have a sustained dialogue on this topic, but he makes a valiant effort toward having that sustained dialogue. The book reads fairly straightforward, and doesn't seem to get bogged down in the contentious mudpuddles or bogs. In the end, Fea seems to get his point across. To answer the reigning question if America was founded as a Christian...
Read more

Union with Christ - An Application

Image
  (This was my weekly letter to my congregation on Wednesday, 21 February 2024) This morning in my devotional reading, I was working through 1 Corinthians 8. Though I’ve read these words a huge number of times over the years, today one verse caused me to stop and take stock.  Paul wrote, “ Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ ” (1 Corinthians 8:12). What struck me is a couple of things. First, in God’s saving work, we are – by grace alone – united (hitched, bonded, ingrafted) to Christ so much so, that what happens to us happens to him, and what is his becomes ours (think of Galatians 2:20, for example). As Sinclair Ferguson put it, “through union with Christ all that is his by incarnation becomes ours through faith” (“The Christian Life,” 110). Let that percolate in your heart for a while. Your fear, anxiety, tears, and so forth, he feels. And his “ Peace, be still ” is yours. Second, the way we treat one an...
Read more

"Ah, Lord! We are Animated by Anger and Anxiety, Fear and Fury..."

Image
I hesitate to put this out there because of the combative environment we are in at present. But I think some souls will take courage from this, and some will also join with me as we get to the end of this little composition. I am struck by the words of God in Zechariah 8. As he rehearses the waywardness and faithlessness of his people in the past, he clearly declares that he " set every man against his neighbor " (8:10). That got me thinking long ago. I started putting the pieces together and realized that one of God's acts of judgment is division, setting a man against his neighbor. That's what happened when he divided his people into the northern tribes and southern tribes (see 1 Kings 11:26-40). Because of Solomon's turning aside, allowing his wives to turn his heart away from the God of his father, David, the Lord brings about a rift in God's people. And this pattern of divisive judgment runs throughout Scripture. On the other hand, truthful unity is the g...
Read more