"How Good it is to Thank the Lord" - Sunday Morning and Evening 13 December 2015

Sunday morning:

How good it is to thank the Lord, and praise to You, Most High, accord, to show Your love with morning light, and tell Your faithfulness each night; yea, good it is Your praise to sing, and all our sweetest music bring.

Mighty God, knowing that you continue to preserve, provide for and govern us and our world, we pray that you would release the nations, including our own country, from war, deprivation, pestilence, catastrophe, violence, radicalism, prejudice, repression and privation; that all may know you alone are God Most High and rise up to give you thanks.

Give ear to our prayer as we cry out to you for the salvation and restoration of all those who have never become Christians and for those who once made the good confession of faith but have since walked away…..we pray that this Season when so  many hear of your great love in sending your Son, that all of the melodies, memories, moments with family, and recitals of your Son’s coming will work in their lives, work over their awareness, and work them up to admit their need of “a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2.11).

Yahweh Rapha, the LORD our healer, please take the woes, hardships and misfortunes people are troubled with (and specifically these) and turn them to good, raising them up with renewed strength to rejoice in your goodness and singular care.

Give this congregation all that we need that we may increase more and more in loving one another, to aspire to live quietly, minding our own affairs, and to work with our hands that we may live properly before outsiders, dependent on no own (other than you) for our daily needs (1 Thessalonians 4.9-12). Also, Lord, we pray even now for our Christmas Eve service. May it be a beautiful time of worship and rejoicing that genuinely honors you; may your children who attend find their faith and joy renewed; and may any who come looking for hope and longing for undying love, obtain their deepest desires in Christ!

God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, turn your attention on your Church throughout the world, including the Malagasy Lutheran Church, the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Slovakia, the Christian Evangelical Church in Minahasa, the Protestant Church of Maluku, and the Evangelical Reformed Church in Bavaria and Northwestern Germany. Please point her in the right direction, steering her rightly, overseeing her and supporting her. And where your people are impoverished and persecuted, give her relief, and defend and fortify her.

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Sunday evening:

“For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him” (2 Chronicles 16.9). Glory to you, Lord God, Most High!

LORD Jesus, who loved your church and gave yourself for her that you might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, we pray for your bride, to include Immanuel Lutheran Church; Lighthouse Lutheran; Lord of Life Lutheran; Lutheran Church of our Savior; Our Lord’s Lutheran; and Peace Lutheran. By your gracious work on her behalf, and within her, we pray that you would continue to transform her toward the goal of you presenting her to yourself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish (Ephesians 5.25-27). O Lord, hear our prayer.

Additionally, Lord Jesus, who executes the office of a King for your people, subduing us to yourself, ruling and defending, and restraining and conquering all your and our enemies: we intercede for brothers and sisters being mangled, mashed or mauled, whether by ISIS, hostile governments, family blood vendettas, lawsuits, legislation, or in print-electronic-social media...make haste, O God, to deliver them! O LORD, make haste to help them (Psalm 70.1)! O Lord, hear our prayer.

And further, Lord Jesus, who is the one mediator between God and men, and gave yourself as a ransom for all (1 Timothy 2.5-6), many of us have tense relationships with friends, co-workers, and family; there are disputes and misunderstandings between husbands and wives; or parents and grown children; siblings; and so forth. Lord, we silently mention those relationships that need your mediating, reconciliation or fixing…Lord, as our mediator between God and man, come and be our mediator between us and the other. Fix up what has been broken; heal up what has been damaged; reconcile what has been put at odds... O Lord, hear our prayer.

Finally, Lord Jesus, we pray that this Christmas Season will not be lost on us. We pray that the Advent series will touch all of us, touch all of our homes, touch all of our relationships, and touch all of our lives. For our Christmas Eve Service, use us to draw in people to hear, people to be healed, people to be helped; and may your Son Jesus be lifted up and draw all people to himself. O Lord, hear our prayer.