Opening response

Hurry, God, to deliver us.
LORD, come quickly to help us.

Prayer of thanksgiving

Blessed are you, Lord God, creator of day and night:
to you be praise and glory forever.
As darkness falls you renew your promise
to reveal among us the light of your presence.
By the light of Christ, your living Word,
dispel the darkness of our hearts
that we may walk as children of light
and sing your praise throughout the world.
Blessed be God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Blessed be God forever.

That this evening may be holy, good and peaceful,
let us pray with one heart and mind.

Silence is kept.

As our evening prayer rises before you, O God,
so may your mercy come down upon us
to cleanse our hearts
and set us free to sing your praise
now and forever.
Amen.

Hymn

Rejoice, the Lord is King!

Charles Wesley

Rejoice, the Lord is King!
Your Lord and King adore,
Mortals, give thanks, and sing,
And triumph evermore;
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice,
Rejoice, again, I say, rejoice.

Jesus the Savior reigns,
The God of truth and love,
When he had purged our stains,
He took his seat above:
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice,
Rejoice, again, I say, rejoice.

His kingdom cannot fail,
He rules over earth and heaven;
The keys of death and hell
Are to our Jesus given:
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice,
Rejoice, again, I say, rejoice.

He sits at God’s right hand,
Till all his foes submit,
And bow to his command,
And fall beneath his feet.
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice,
Rejoice, again, I say, rejoice.

He all his foes shall quell,
Shall all our sins destroy,
And every bosom swell
With pure seraphic joy;
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice,
Rejoice, again, I say, rejoice.

Rejoice in glorious hope,
Jesus the judge shall come;
And take his servants up
To their eternal home:
We soon shall hear the archangel’s voice,
The trump of God shall sound, Rejoice.

Confession of sin

Let us confess our sins against God and our neighbor.

Silence may be kept.

Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done,
and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us;
that we may delight in your will,
and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your name. Amen.

Almighty God have mercy on us, forgive us all our sins
through our Lord Jesus Christ, strengthen us in all
goodness, and by the power of the Holy Spirit keep us in
eternal life.
Amen.

Psalm 33

Refrain:
The earth is full of the loving kindness of the LORD.

Rejoice in the LORD, you righteous!
Praise is fitting for the upright.
Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre.
Sing praises to him with the harp of ten strings.
Sing to him a new song.
Play skillfully with a shout of joy!
For the LORD’s word is right.
All his work is done in faithfulness.
He loves righteousness and justice.
The earth is full of the loving kindness of the LORD.
By the LORD’s word, the heavens were made:
all their army by the breath of his mouth.
He gathers the waters of the sea together as a heap.
He lays up the deeps in storehouses.
Let all the earth fear the LORD.
Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
For he spoke, and it was done.
He commanded, and it stood firm.
The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nothing.
He makes the thoughts of the peoples to be of no effect.
The counsel of the LORD stands fast forever,
the thoughts of his heart to all generations.
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people whom he has chosen for his own inheritance.
The LORD looks from heaven.
He sees all the sons of men.
From the place of his habitation he looks out on all the inhabitants of the earth,
he who fashions all of their hearts;
and he considers all of their works.
There is no king saved by the multitude of an army.
A mighty man is not delivered by great strength.
A horse is a vain thing for safety,
neither does he deliver any by his great power.
Behold, the LORD’s eye is on those who fear him,
on those who hope in his loving kindness,
to deliver their soul from death,
to keep them alive in famine.
Our soul has waited for the LORD.
He is our help and our shield.
For our heart rejoices in him,
because we have trusted in his holy name.
Let your loving kindness be on us, LORD,
since we have hoped in you.

Glory to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit;
as it was in the beginning is now
and will be forever. Amen.

Refrain:
The earth is full of the loving kindness of the LORD.

Psalm prayer

Feed your people, Lord,
with your holy word
and free us from the emptiness of our
wrongful desires,
that we may sing the new song of salvation
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Old Testament reading

1 Kings 8:63-9:9

Solomon offered for the sacrifice of peace offerings, which he offered to the LORD, twenty two thousand head of cattle and one hundred and twenty thousand sheep. So the king and all the children of Israel dedicated the LORD’s house. The same day the king made the middle of the court holy that was before the LORD’s house; for there he offered the burnt offering, the meal offering, and the fat of the peace offerings, because the bronze altar that was before the LORD was too little to receive the burnt offering, the meal offering, and the fat of the peace offerings.

So Solomon held the feast at that time, and all Israel with him, a great assembly, from the entrance of Hamath to the brook of Egypt, before the LORD our God, seven days and seven more days, even fourteen days. On the eighth day he sent the people away; and they blessed the king, and went to their tents joyful and glad in their hearts for all the goodness that the LORD had shown to David his servant, and to Israel his people.

When Solomon had finished the building of the LORD’s house, the king’s house, and all Solomon’s desire which he was pleased to do, The LORD appeared to Solomon the second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. The LORD said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your supplication that you have made before me. I have made this house holy, which you have built, to put my name there forever; and my eyes and my heart shall be there perpetually. As for you, if you will walk before me as David your father walked, in integrity of heart and in uprightness, to do according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep my statutes and my ordinances, then I will establish the throne of your kingdom over Israel forever, as I promised to David your father, saying, ‘There shall not fail from you a man on the throne of Israel.’ But if you turn away from following me, you or your children, and not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and I will cast this house, which I have made holy for my name, out of my sight; and Israel will be a proverb and a byword amongst all peoples. Though this house is so high, yet everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss; and they will say, ‘Why has the LORD done this to this land and to this house?’ and they will answer, ‘Because they abandoned the LORD their God, who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and embraced other gods, and worshipped them, and served them. Therefore the LORD has brought all this evil on them.’ ”

Silence may be kept.

New Testament reading

Acts 16:25-40

But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s bonds were loosened. The jailer, being roused out of sleep and seeing the prison doors open, drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried with a loud voice, saying, “Don’t harm yourself, for we are all here!”

He called for lights, sprang in, fell down trembling before Paul and Silas, brought them out, and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.” They spoke the word of the Lord to him, and to all who were in his house.

He took them the same hour of the night and washed their stripes, and was immediately baptised, he and all his household. He brought them up into his house and set food before them, and rejoiced greatly with all his household, having believed in God.

But when it was day, the magistrates sent the sergeants, saying, “Let those men go.”

The jailer reported these words to Paul, saying, “The magistrates have sent to let you go; now therefore come out and go in peace.”

But Paul said to them, “They have beaten us publicly without a trial, men who are Romans, and have cast us into prison! Do they now release us secretly? No, most certainly, but let them come themselves and bring us out!”

The sergeants reported these words to the magistrates, and they were afraid when they heard that they were Romans, and they came and begged them. When they had brought them out, they asked them to depart from the city. They went out of the prison and entered into Lydia’s house. When they had seen the brothers, they encouraged them, then departed.

Silence may be kept.

The Magnificat (The Song of Mary)

Luke 1:46-55

Refrain:
Your mercy is for generations and generations on those who fear you.

My soul magnifies the Lord.
My spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior,
for he has looked at the humble state of his servant.
For behold, from now on, all generations will call me blessed.
For he who is mighty has done great things for me.
Holy is his name.
His mercy is for generations and generations on those who fear him.
He has shown strength with his arm.
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down princes from their thrones,
and has exalted the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things.
He has sent the rich away empty.
He has given help to Israel, his servant, that he might remember mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and his offspring forever.

Glory to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit;
as it was in the beginning is now
and will be forever. Amen.

Refrain:
Your mercy is for generations and generations on those who fear you.

Brief silence.

The Apostle’s Creed

Let us unite in this historic confession of the Christian faith:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again;
he ascended into heaven,
is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and will come again to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.

Thanksgiving and intercession

Thanksgiving may be made for the day.

Intercessions are offered
for peace
for individuals and their needs

Prayers may include the following concerns:

All who are sick in body, mind or spirit
Those in the midst of famine or disaster
Victims of abuse and violence, intolerance and prejudice
Those who are bereaved
All who work in the medical and healing professions

Other intercessions and supplications may be offered as the Holy Spirit leads.

Response

Lord of life
In your mercy, hear us.

Silence may be kept.

Collect of the day

God, who in generous mercy sent the Holy Spirit
upon your church in the burning fire of your love:
grant that your people may be fervent
in the fellowship of the gospel
that, always abiding in you,
they may be found steadfast in faith and active in service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.
Amen.

The Lord’s Prayer

As our Savior taught us, so we pray

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours
now and forever.
Amen.

Conclusion

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God,
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit,
be with us all evermore.
Amen.