Liturgy

God of our past and our present,
God of our future, yet to be and awaited,
God of our years, our days, and even of this moment:

Our lives are deeply rooted in miracles before us,
Our faith is richly set in courage running thick,
Our vocation is shaped by all those
who have risked for your purposes.

And now, in our remembering, make us mindful
of our own place of calling, and
our own time of obedience.

We pray for ourselves, our neighborhoods and our world,
courage beyond our easier timidity,
vision beyond our present tense,
restlessness beyond our ready settlements, and
yielding beyond our will to manage.

Give us appropriate yielding that we may be like our remembered
ones in freedom and in love for you.

We pray in the name of Jesus whom we remember until he comes again.
Amen.

Congregational Prayer

In prayer, let us confess to God as a community.

Holy, Perfect God,
We admit that we put other things above you in our lives.
We say we long for you, but we actually long for more stability
and more comfort.

Lord, you will come with darkness for us
if our hearts remain captive to anything but you.

We confess that we are openly rebellious against you.
We are fallen, never to rise again unless you lift us up.

Lord, we fail to worship you with our hearts.
Our spiritual gatherings are hollow
when our hearts are slaves to lesser things.

We pay you a visit on Sunday, but we long to go home to other gods.

Lord God, we confess that we break your heart.
Forgive us when we gather before you half-heartedly,
waiting to go back to worshipping ourselves.

When we truly worship you, we will seek good and not evil.
We will seek justice and grace.

Lord God, have mercy.
Renew our hearts within us.
Make us long for you, our Creator and Savior,
God in community, holy in One,
Amen.

Reflection

What should waiting for God’s promises look like for us?
How can we turn off things in our lives in order to focus on listening to what He is saying?

Benediction

Go now, as the Spirit of God has called you:

to be a waiting people of grace,
to be a waiting people of truth,
to be a waiting people who pursue peace,

to be a people who forgive
and to be a waiting people who love.

May God lead and guide us
in the name of the Father,
of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Go in peace and live the church.
See you throughout the week.

[Photo by Intrepidation @ Flickr]