a prayer of approach and confession based on psalm 8

Prayers of Approach and Confession

O LORD, our God
How majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
Out of the mouths of babes and infants
you have founded a bulwark because of your foes,
to silence the enemy and the avenger.

When we look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established,
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?
O LORD, our God how majestic is your name in all the earth!         (Psalm 8)

prayers after singing "come, o fount of every blessing"

Prayers of Approach & Confession

You … fount of every blessing.
You … everflowing stream of mercy.
You … mountain of unfailing love.
You … worthy of all our praise.

You and then us …
Us … pausing in our sojourn, grateful to be with You
Us … trusting You at every turn to guide us safely home
Us … tuning our hearts to sing and to live Your grace
Us … a people who rely upon You.

resources for transfiguration sunday

The Transfiguration of Jesus
by Armando Alemdar Ara
Wikimedia

This coming Sunday marks the conclusion of the season after Epiphany. Each year on this day the church retells the story of the Transfiguration of Jesus. Looking back over the years I have posted testimony to what God is up to on the Mount of Transfiguration.

Here is a description of the way in which this Sunday fits in the Christian Year - Glory Redefined. Here is a sermon for Transfiguration Sunday - The Glory of God in the Face of Jesus Christ. Here is a prayer offered on this day - You Are There. And here is a quotation from the novel "Gilead" by Marilynne Robinson - Wherever You Turn Your Eyes.

a prayer of approach & confession, a declaration of grace

A Prayer of Approach & Confession

You.
You speaking your goodness into creation.
You birthing your Word in human flesh.
You enflaming your church with speech.
You.
Great Three in One.
We worship You.
We praise You.
We adore You.
You, our hope.
You, in glory.
You, with power.
You.
And then us.
Us in praise.
Us in gratitude.
Us in love.
With you.

a palm / passion sunday prayer of intercession

I offered this Prayer of Intercession for Palm/Passion Sunday when I served as Worship Elder during Holy Week at University Congregation. It followed the singing of the hymn "Ride on! Ride on in Majesty!"

Ride on! Ride on in majesty!
         You who shape the stars and sky.
         You who hold the sun and sea.
         You who shape today and tomorrow.
         You who hold neighbour and stranger.
                    Your steadfast love, your tender mercies, your startling grace
                             suffers all, bears all, hopes all
                                     and we are in awe, speechless in gratitude.

a palm / passion sunday prayer of approach & confession

I offered this Prayer of Approach and Confession for Palm/Passion Sunday when I served as Worship Elder during Holy Week at University Congregation.

You come to us in humility.
You enter the gates of the city on a donkey.
You pass through the doors of our hearts as long-awaited guest.
               

We cry: “Hosanna … Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord.”

Blessed are You, for You know the truth about the trouble
          in our world,
          in our city,
          in our soul.

a prayer at my mother's funeral

Yesterday we held a Memorial Service for my mother, Anne Searcy. Her obituary is here.  The text for the service was Matthew 5:1-16 (The Beatitudes). My role in the service was to lead the Prayer of Thanksgiving and Supplication. Here is that prayer ...

in the wounded places

When not preaching at University Hill Congregation I take on the role of worship elder, leading congregational prayers. On Sunday the prayers of approach and confession followed the singing of "O God Beyond All Praising". Following the confession we sang "Jesu, Tawa Pano" and then responded to the declaration of grace with "Gloria". Here are those prayers ...

Prayers of Approach & Confession

Great God of heaven and earth,

Maker of the stars and the sun
You are beyond all praising,
              beyond all knowing, 

              beyond all telling.

You are beyond us.

You are holy. 

you are there

On Sunday at University Hill Congregation our guest preacher, Peter Short, entitled his sermon on the story of the Transfiguration "The Seeing Place." In it he noted that on the Mount of Transfiguration the disciples see through Jesus' ministry to the presence of God. After the sermon the congregation sang the hymn "In the Quiet Curve of Evening" with its refrain "You are there, You are there, You are there." As worship elder my task included offering the prayers of the people that followed ...

You are there. 

This is what we have heard of You. 

The ancestors have entrusted the precious message to each passing generation.

Now the sacred message is ours to live and to tell:

You are there. 

You are there in the quiet curve of evening and in the noisy din of noonday.

You are there in the melting down of endings and in the labour pains of newness.

You are there.

speak your word of life

A prayer before preaching (based on Isaiah 55:8-12). A sermon based on this text can be found at like rain and snow.

You whose thoughts are not our thoughts,
You whose ways are not our ways,
as You send forth the rain and the snow
       to water the earth
            giving seed to the sower
                 and bread to the eater ...

with our friday fatigue

On Good Friday we hosted a neighbouring Anglican congregation in worship (next year that same congregation will host us). It meant that the Anglican priest was our powerful preacher. At University Hill the prayers are not led by the preacher. Since I am regularly the preacher it means that I rarely lead the prayers. However, on a day when I am not preaching it is my turn to offer prayer. The prayer of confession today took the form of the Solemn Reproaches of the Cross. My task was to speak the prayers of approach and of intercession on behalf of the congregation. Here they are ...

holy thursday

Today is Ascension Day, forty days after Easter Sunday, ten days before Pentecost. It is the day referred to in William Blake's two poems titled "Holy Thursday". In his day it was a major festival. The day continues to be a public holiday in some countries. On Sunday we will replace the readings for the seventh Sunday of Easter with the readings for the Ascension of the Lord as we try to recover our communal memory of the Ascension and its place in the gospel story that narrates our life.

There are not many hymns for Ascension Day in The United Church of Canada hymn book. I suspect it is because we do not pay much attention to this event. But there is a prayer for Ascension Day. This is it: 

overhearing prayer

How does a congregation learn to pray? Corporate prayer is learned over time through practices that nurture and feed growth in honest speech before God. When I arrived at University Hill Congregation nearly twenty years ago I met a congregation learning cadences of prayer that I had not heard before in worship.

In the congregations I served previously leadership in public prayer fell mainly to me. It was the minister’s job to lead the prayers. While scripture might regularly be read by a lay lector, the prayers were chosen or written by me, the minister. But this is no longer the case. At University Hill Congregation the prayers have been written and led by a lay worship elder, Sunday by Sunday, season by season, year by year, for nearly three decades.

the god we would rather have

We are your people and mostly we don't mind,
       except that you do not fit any of our categories.
We keep pushing
                  and pulling
                  and twisting
                  and turning,
       trying to make you fit the God we would rather have,
                  and every time we distort you that way
                             we end up with an idol more congenial to us.

your new news

The pain is palpable,
          death is close,
the bruises are countless,
                 and we are not comforted.
We know about steel against flesh,
           and explosions next to skin,
           and grenades upon bodies,
           and wounds untended,
                             infected,
                             filled with pus.
           All this is old news to us.

kyrie

Because we cannot be clever and honest
and are inventors of things more intricate
than the snowflake - Lord have mercy.

Because we are full of pride
in our humility and because we believe
in our disbelief - Lord have mercy.

Because we will protect ourselves
from ourselves to the point
of destroying ourselves - Lord have mercy.

And because on the slope to perfection,
when we should be half-way up,
we are half-way down - Lord have mercy.

- R.S. Thomas (from "Mass for Hard Times")

prophetic imagination

Recently I posted some thoughts about my rabbi, Martin Cohen. This is a post about my teacher. Well, of course, he is one of many of my teachers. Looking back there have been a number of teachers who have shaped my life, perhaps no more profoundly than those within my own family. Beyond the family there was surely Fred Lepkin, my high school history teacher. How to describe Mr. Lepkin? One of a kind! Among many others in seminary there was Ralph Donnelly who taught us about the life and identity of the pastor and the wonder of a local congregation. What did they have in common? They were passionate about their subject, they were totally engaging as people and they encouraged and challenged me to grow.

sit down, Master, on this rude chair

a prayer for the week ...


Sit down, Master, on this rude chair of praises, and rule my nervous heart with your great decrees of freedom. Out of time you have taken me to do my daily task. Out of mist and dust you have fashioned me to know the numberless worlds between the crown and the kingdom. In utter defeat I came to you and you received me with a sweetness I had not dared to remember. Tonight I come to you again, soiled by strategies and trapped in the loneliness of my tiny domain. Establish your law in this walled place. Let nine men come to lift me into their prayer so that I may whisper with them: Blessed be the name of the glory of the kingdom for ever and ever.

- Leonard Cohen, from "Book of Mercy", 1984

You live at the hinge

a prayer for the week ...


You brood in the night in its fearfulness,
You dawn the day in its energy,
    You move at the edge of night
          into the margin of day.
You take the feeble night and give us strong day,
    You take our fatigue and bestow courage,
    You take our drowsy reluctance and fashion full-blooded zeal.
What shall we say?
    You, only you, you
    You at the hinge - and then the day.
You - and then us,
    from you in faithfulness,
    us for the day,
    us in the freedom and courage and energy,
    and then back to you - in trust and gratitude.
Amen.

- by Walter Brueggemann, from "Awed to Heaven, Rooted in Earth", 2003, p.5.