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4/17/2019 0 Comments Prayer of Confession, Easter C Call to Confession
Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. Acts 2:38-39 Let us confess our sin together and receive the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus Christ. Prayer of Confession, Easter C Here we are, God, showing partiality among your children. Playing favorites. Excluding the other. Here we are, standing at the foot of the cross, confessing the nails we pounded because we refuse to look beyond our biases to love our neighbor and welcome the stranger. You commanded us to preach the Good News and to testify to the wonderful things our God has done, but our unkind actions defy our words, and our angry words defy our identity as Children of God. Forgive us, we pray. Free us from the hatred and bigotry that attempts to lock us into stone cold prisons, that we may claim the freedom of love and grace won for us and for all humankind in Jesus Christ and share it with the world! Assurance of God's Grace Jesus himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. 1 Peter 2:24 In the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven. Thanks be to God! Since God has forgiven us in Christ, let us also forgive one another. The peace of Christ be with you. Please extend the peace of Christ to all whom you encounter this day.
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4/16/2019 0 Comments Call to Worship, Easter, Year C Come, you witnesses to the truth,
you who have seen the grace of God up close and experienced its overwhelming power. Come, you who have known healing of body, mind, and spirit at Jesus' hand, and you who still seek it. Come, that you may testify to what you have seen and heard and known. Come and worship.  When we risk ourselves to follow you,
and find ourselves in uncharted territory, claiming things in your name that others are sure belong to them, grant us courage, Lord, and give us the words to say that will reassure and calm fears and open a path to you for those who may not have found it otherwise. When we lay our lives before you, uncertain of what that will mean ... of the danger that lies ahead ... of the pain that will be endured ... of the betrayal and the shame, be present with us, for you have walked this path before, and you know what we can hardly imagine. Grant us strength, we pray, and grant us courage to be the disciples you have called us to be. When we sing your praises joyfully and with loud voices, and those in authority attempt to silence us, by demanding us to stop ... by ridiculing and reprimanding ... by lording their power over us ... inspire us to remain authentic and to worship you unabashedly, for even if we were to be silenced, the stones themselves would cry out. Hear our prayers, O God, for those who do not understand what it means to go fearlessly, to love radically, to lead humbly, to worship wholeheartedly. Fill them with your Spirit, and let release the demons that live within them, that they, too, can know the unrestrained joy of life in your grace.  Call to Confession
We have sinned because we have forsaken the Lord. (1 Samuel 12:10a) Let us confess our sin before God, and seek God's mercy. Prayer of Confession, Palm Sunday, Year C Forgive us, God. We do not take even a moment to honor you, to celebrate your presence in our midst. We do not shout your praises or tell of the wonders we have seen. In fact, we are often among the first to condemn those who do. In your mercy, Lord, forgive our failure to worship you and to lay our very lives at your feet. Lead us ever forward in gratitude and joy to tell the Good News of your mercy. Assurance of God's Grace For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich. (2 Corinthians 8:9) In the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven! Thanks be to God! Since God has forgiven us in Christ, let us also forgive one another. The peace of Christ be with you. Please extend the peace of Christ to those whom you encounter this day.  Hosanna!
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven! Hosanna! 4/5/2019 0 Comments Prayers of the People, Lent 5C So many of your children, Lord,
are still stuck in Egypt, mourning losses, enslaved by fear, fatigued from fighting demons they cannot fully identify. Their past has formed their present and the future looks impossible. Hopelessness overtakes them, and they feel so betrayed they dare not put their trust in you. Surround them with your love, O God. Grant them a community with patience and strength enough to carry them through the darkest of their days until they can see the path you have made that leads them to newness of life. So many of your children, Lord, are poisoned by the water they drink, water unfit for human consumption, water contaminated by pollutants of all kinds. Disease is rampant. People are dying. Creatures are dying. Governments are failing to provide what you called good at the beginning of time. Empower your people to speak out against greed and neglect and raise up from among us leaders who will protect that which has been gifted to us and placed in our charge. So many of your children are longing to see the new thing you have promised. Some can envision it, but there is much disagreement about how it is accomplished. Remind us to listen, Lord, to you and to each other. Calm our anxious spirits, and help us sit with one another in openness and compassion, and look for the ways in which your will might be done for the manifestation of the common good. 4/3/2019 0 Comments Prayer of Confession, Lent 5C Call to Confession
God made streams come out of the rock, and caused waters to flow down like rivers. Yet they sinned still more against God, rebelling against the Most High in the desert. They tested God in their heart by demanding the food they craved. They spoke against God, saying, “Can God spread a table in the wilderness? Even though he struck the rock so that water gushed out and torrents overflowed, can he also give bread, or provide meat for his people?” Psalm 78:16-20 Let us confess the ways in which we have sinned against our God and seek God's mercy. Prayer of Confession, Lent 5C Here we sit, Lord, wallowing in our history, nursing our pain. We refuse to open our eyes, to look beyond our tunnel vision, to accept our shortsightedness is keeping us from seeing the new thing you are doing in our midst. Where we see impossibilities, you see infinite possibilities. Where we see hopelessness, you see hope. Forgive us, we pray, and enlarge our vision, that we might become integral parts of the kingdom work you are doing on earth, and we won't forget to praise you with every living creature. Assurance of God's Grace 2Corinthians 5:17 So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! In the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven. Thanks be to God! Since God has forgiven us in Christ, let us also forgive one another. The peace of Christ be with you. Please extend the peace of Christ to all whom you encounter this day. 4/2/2019 0 Comments Call to Worship, Lent 5C Our God is Liberator, who frees the slave
and brings justice to the oppressed. Our God is Creator, who forms the earth and all that is in it, who calms the waves and makes rivers flow in the desert. Our God is Sovereign, and is worthy of glory and honor and praise. Let us worship God! 3/29/2019 0 Comments Prayers of the People, Lent 4C Gathered into the circle of healing, Lord,
we call upon your name. We lift our prayers to you ... prayers of thanksgiving for the miraculous journey that has led us to this place in our lives, prayers from the deepest places within where we recognize our unworthiness and cannot begin to put into words our expressions of gratitude. Hear our prayers for those who have not seen the fulfillment of your promises, who have longed to see the Promised Land and have died in the wilderness along the way. Comfort those who grieve their loss, and be for them a mighty fortress as they seek to live out the promise of hope in memory of those who went before and set the path. Hear our prayers for those who lead us into new territory to be the people you have called us to be. Grant them wisdom and courage to direct your people according to your Word. Remind them of the many ways you have led your people before and inspire them to reflect meaningfully on what that means for your people going forward. Teach them to listen, Lord, to you and to one another, and to look to your law of love to govern and to guide. O Lord, be present at our tables, as both host and honored guest, and season our conversations with kindness and with grace. May we be ever mindful of those who do not have bread to eat that we might commit ourselves to working for a world where all will be fed. Bless each one whose labor has contributed to the meals we are blessed to share: from the producer to the trucker to the grocer to the cook, that they might prosper by your hand. May our bodies be so nourished by the gifts of the earth and our spirits by these moments in community that we will be fortified to return to the work you have called us to do. May it be so. 3/27/2019 0 Comments Prayer of Confession, Lent 4C Call to Confession
While we kept silence, our bodies wasted away through our groaning all day long. (Psalm 32:3) Let us confess our sin before God, and seek God's healing mercy. Prayer of Confession, L4C Turn away the disgrace we dread, O God. Hear our inward groans of despair. We have defiled ourselves, delighting in idols. We have been failthless when you were faithful, contrary when you were merciful, rebellious when you gave instruction. Do not pour out your wrath upon us, or spend your anger against us, but hear our anguish of spirit and restore us to favor in your sight. Guide us to springs of the water of life, we pray, and we will sing for gladness of heart. Assurance of God's Grace God's mercy is from everlasting to everlasting. In the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven. Thanks be to God! Since God has forgiven us in Christ, let us also forgive one another. The peace of Christ be with you. Please extend the peace of Christ to all whom you encounter this day. |
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