The Pastor’s Corner

Prayer: Grant almighty God that we, as your redeemed people, would heed the warnings and instructions found in your Word and seek to live in it all of our days. As we read and meditate on your Word, we receive your counsel and mind. Your Spirit is communicating your will for our lives through it. Though there are times when we receive counsel from the ungodly, we know that counsel cannot stand in your sight. We are ashamed at how often we take instruction from things that do not point us in the paths of righteousness. Your Word directs us to take counsel in you and delight in your Word as that light unto our path. Grant, therefore, holy Father, that we would bear fruit from finding our source of hope and instruction in the infallible Word written for our good. Please grant us a hunger and thirst for righteousness we pray through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Prayer: Our God in heaven, we lament and ask what it is that makes your people stray so easily from your paths. We take note of the ease with which we wander from the green pastures you have provided for us. We are ashamed at how easily the enemy of our souls leads us by the nose, enticing us with our desires, leading to disaster and destruction. We grieve the reality that we are prone to wander, Lord, we feel it, prone to leave the God we love. We are easily enthralled with the desires of this life, exposing the worldliness of our hearts. We trade that which is right for that which pleases the eyes, the flesh, and pride. No wonder your word calls us creatures of dust and unprofitable servants. Yet, despite all these things, you demonstrated your love toward us in that while we were still sinners, your Son died for us. He died because we do wander. He died because we are easily lured and enticed by the Evil One. He dies because we are sinful to the core. Through Christ, we now have peace of conscience with you. We thank you for so great a salvation. Please grant us a greater willingness to mortify the deeds of the flesh and serve you all our days we pray through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Prayer: Grant, Almighty God, that as Thou invites us daily with so much kindness and love and makes known to us Thy paternal goodwill, which Thou didst once show to us in Christ Thy Son -- O grant that, being allured by Thy goodness, we may surrender ourselves wholly to Thee, and become so teachable and submissive that wherever Thou guidest us by Thy Spirit, Thou mayest follow us with every blessing.

Let us not, in the meantime, be deaf to Thy warnings; and whenever we deviate from the right way, grant that we may immediately awake when Thou warnest us, and return to the right path, and deign Thou also to embrace us and reconcile us to Thyself through Christ our Lord. Amen.
(From Lifting Up our Hearts: 150 Selected prayers of John Calvin)

Prayer: Our God in heaven: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we praise you and thank you for giving us another Lord's Day that is a picture of our eternal hope and rest guaranteed by the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as you delivered your people of old to their promised rest pictured for us in the land of Caanan, we too have been given a sure hope of a better country not made with the hands of men but by your own hands. In that place, there will be no more tears or sorrow or pain or suffering or death. It is a place we long to see, knowing that it is beyond anything we can imagine. Yet, because you are good to us and know that we need to be reminded of that hope, you have given us one day in seven to come apart from our worldly labors and entertainments to commune with you with your people and to hear from you as your Word is read and, especially, proclaimed. We ask that you give us hearts and minds prepared to worship you today and that we do it with zeal and joy for all you have done for us. We pray that you will forgive us for our abuse of this day and remind us of our privilege to obey you granted by the work of your Spirit. Please help us, therefore, to love the Lord's Day as we love to think on eternity. Be pleased to change our affections to that which is good, right, and lovely we pray through Christ our Lord. Amen.