Congregational Prayers and Father's Day - 2023

 

Because your Son, Jesus the Messiah, has made us kings and priests unto you our God, we come offering you our thanks and intercessions. We thank you for all of your generosity to us shown in safe travels, medical care, homes, food, clothing, families, love and warmth.

We pray for your Church throughout the nations, including Southern Hills Church of God, Broadway, Czech Hall Road, and Faith Tabernacle Church of God in Christ, as well as Emmanuel Upstate PCA and my friend Billy Castro in Greenville S.C. and Shawnee PCA and Matt Wiley. Guide us in all peace and holiness, without which we cannot expect to see you. Make up our lack and further the good effects of our work done in accordance with your will and way. May we fully embrace the fullness of the Gospel of your Son, Jesus Christ and his kingdom, growing in all godliness and joy.

Thank you for lifting up your face on our General Assembly. Continue to fortify our faithfulness, supplement our solidarity, and enlarge our love. Give refreshment and recovery to all who worked to organize this G.A., those out front and those behind the scenes.

Be with us in this congregation Good Lord and help us who have been brought forth by your Word of Truth as a kind of firstfruits of your creatures, and make us quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, being doers of your Word and not hearers only. We also ask that you would give us increasing opportunities to make disciples of Christ, adding to our number such as are being saved.

We pray earnestly for those we know who need to repent of their sins and believe in Christ, those who have strayed away and need to be restored, and those whose faith is shaken (…). Have mercy on them and raise them to true and new life!

O Lord God, be with our nation and our governmental leaders, and rouse us so that godliness, righteousness, and mercy will run through us like mighty rivers. And hear us, O Lord, as we petition your most holy, wise and powerful preserving and governing of the nations of this world, including Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, and Portugal. Please bring under control the warring factions and chaotic turmoil plaguing many countries; restore peace and wholesome order.

We intercede on behalf of those who are troubled and careworn by physical, financial, familial, marital, emotional and spiritual distresses (…). May your hand be upon them for good, to mend what is broken, repair the breaches, shore up the crumbling, and lift up the downhearted. 

Finally, with Father’s Day in mind, we thank you for the fathers who have given themselves to enrich their families and have loved dearly. We pray for the fathers we know who followed other pursuits and left their families. Please bring them to see where they have failed and help them to make things right in their families. That those who have been abusive and demeaning would come to see how they have harmed, and ask forgiveness. Repair the memories and hurts of those who have been wounded by their fathers. For the fathers in our midst and among our families, may they draw closer to you, O Father, and learn from you how to be better fathers; and by your Spirit’s work in them, may they guide and lead their families well in the way of the LORD. All of these petitions we ask for Christ’s sake. And now, we join voices and hearts together to pray as our Lord Jesus directed, saying, Our Father, who art in heaven…