Adam and Eve, with a scary-looking Satan after them. From the Montaubaun Book of Hours (a sort of prayer book), ca. 1430.
Prayers
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Lord's Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.
Amen.
Prayer to Be Close to God
Mighty Lord, I come before you today to thank You for all the blessings that You have given me. Many times my life is so full of busy work that I neglect my relationship with You, and for that I am deeply sorry. I know that You never neglect me, for if You did my very life would cease to be. Continue to pull me to Yourself, guide me in my journey, and hold me close in Your bosom until the day I come home to be with You forever. Be with me now as I gather together with this online community, in Your name, that I and all who pray with me may feel your presence among us. In Jesus precious name I pray.
Amen.
adapted from unk. source by Mason Barge 5/16/2015
Confession
Have mercy on me, Oh Lord, for I am a humble and miserable sinner. [At this point, pause to remember specific sins you have committed during the day and speak or think them.] I renounce all of these sins, heavenly Father, and repent of them, and I promise to make every effort not to repeat them.
Have mercy on me, pardon me for these offences and any I might have omitted from forgetfulness or ignorance; in the name of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior, I pray for forgiveness. And I pray that your Holy Spirit may dwell with me in the coming day, to comfort me, to give me strength against temptation, and to guide me into the path of righteousness.
Amen.
To Overcome an Impediment to Faith
O Lord God, I do truly love you and in my heart want to serve you, I have encountered some sort of impediment — or perhaps I could call it a stumbling-block — in my journey of faith, and I find that I am falling away from my love and service and faith.
I pray desperately that you will help me to overcome this obstacle and find my way back to you. O mighty God, you have all power, and I know you have the power to help me find you. Please dear God, send a spirit to me, let Your Holy Spirit work within me, to bolster my faith and fear of you. Show me the way around this impediment, I plead with you Lord God; for having found you, and having been found by you, I want more than anything else in the world to know you, to spend my time and energy living in Christ, loving you before all things, and serving you and my fellow creatures in humility, in love, and in purity.
By my faith in Christ I dare to ask you this great favor — that you will lead me out of this terrible spiritual morass into which I have fallen. Help me to raise my eyes, to see your Word like a lost sailor in a storm finding the light from a lighthouse. In the name of Christ, help me to find you, for you are my everything.
Amen.
Mason Barge 6/17/2015
Doxology
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever!
Amen.
Paul, Epistle to the Ephesians, 12/11/13
Mina, an Italian pop singer from the 70s, uses her extraordinary low range and rasping, anguished style to produce a unique
Magnificat, set to a beautiful minor-key melody by Marco Frisina. Fabulous.
I, wisdom, dwell with prudence,
and I find knowledge and discretion.
The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil.
Pride and arrogance and the way of evil
and perverted speech I hate.
John 17:1-10 (ESV)
The High Priestly Prayer [Part 1]
hen Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.”
“I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.”
“I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.”
Notes on the Scripture
John 17 consists entirely of Jesus’ last prayer, a long prayer he said aloud just before his arrest. It has three parts: First, he prays for himself; second, for his disciples; and third, for the entire world. Today’s selection contains the entirety of his prayer for himself, and the beginning of his prayer for his disciples.
Although partly it is an actual prayer, in part it is a summation or conclusion of his life and teaching for the benefit of listeners and those who, like us, will read it later. In the first part, he states that his work on earth is finished, and asks the Father to glorify him. In this context, “glorify” signifies that it is time for him to be arrested, killed, resurrected, and ascend to heaven. The timing emphasizes the dichotomy between Jesus’ life and His resurrection and ascension. In His life, He became a servant, giving up His divinity to become a model example of what He preached: humility, service, and self-abasement. In His resurrection, He proves the value of His humble life by being glorified of the Father.
The prayer transitions seamlessly into a prayer for his disciples. Christ affirms that the disciples now fully believe in Him: that what He says is the word of God. He also begins to identify himself as part of the Godhead; for he says that all God has is now His.
Finally, He states that glory has come to him through his disciples. This is a bit startling, because only a short time ago, he firmly refuted the idea that his glory came from men. Yet now, he prays to the Father that glory has come to him from his true disciples — that is, those who believe in him 100%.
This is unlike almost anything else in the New Testament. Christ is glorified in those who believe in Him. We have a part to play in the glorification of God! Here we begin to understand that glorification of God is the antithesis of human pride; glorification of God replaces pride as the central theme of human existence.
Matthew 5:34: I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool . . . . Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil.
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Daily Quiz
Top score(s) on the Daily Quiz for Oct 23, 2018 were:
Norman Daniels (12) Elaine Gibson (11) Sylvia Banda (11) randall martin (11)
Top score(s) on Match-a-Verse:
Pam Carpenter (9 out of 9) Kathryn Halfman (9 out of 9) Elaine Gibson (9 out of 9) Sylvia Banda (9 out of 9) Allison King (9 out of 9) randall martin (9 out of 9)
