Fri. morning Mar. 6
Opening response
O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
Hear my voice according to your lovingkindness.
O LORD, give me life according to your judgment.
Prayer of thanksgiving
Blessed are you, God of compassion and mercy, to you be praise and glory forever. In the darkness of our sin, your light breaks forth like the dawn and your healing springs up for deliverance. As we rejoice in the gift of your saving help, sustain us with your bountiful Spirit and open our lips to sing your praise.
Blessed be God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Blessed be God forever.
The night has passed, and the day lies open before us; let us pray with one heart and mind.
Silence is kept.
As we rejoice in the gift of this new day, so may the light of your presence, O God, set our hearts on fire with love for you; now and forever.
Amen.
Hymn
New Every Morning Is the Love
Words: John Keble (1792-1866)
Music: Samuel Webbe the elder (1740-1816)
Our Great Redeemer’s Praise (#333)
New every morning is the love
Our wakening and uprising prove;
Through sleep and darkness safely brought,
Restored to life, and power, and thought.
New mercies, each returning day,
Hover around us while we pray;
New perils past, new sins forgiven,
New thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven.
If on our daily course our mind
Be set to hallow all we find,
New treasures still, of countless price,
God will provide for sacrifice.
The trivial round, the common task,
Would furnish all we ought to ask,
Room to deny ourselves, a road
To bring us daily nearer God.
Only, O Lord, in thy dear love
Fit us for perfect rest above;
And help us this and every day
To live more nearly as we pray.
Confession of Sin
When we cry to the LORD in our trouble,
He will save us from our distress.
God will bring us out of darkness
and out of the shadow of death.
Lord, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
A time of silence and self-examination may be kept.
May the Father forgive us by the death of his Son, and strengthen us to live in the power of the Spirit all our days.
Amen.
Let us give thanks to the LORD for His goodness,
and for His wonderful works to all people!
Let us offer sacrifices of thanksgiving,
and declare God’s works with rejoicing.
cf Psalm 107
Psalm 40
𝙍: You have multiplied your wondrous deeds, O LORD.
I waited patiently for the LORD,
and He turned to me and heard my cry.
He also brought me up out of a horrible pit,
out of the miry clay,
and set my feet upon a rock,
and established my steps.
He has put a new song in my mouth,
praise to our God;
many will see it and fear,
and will trust in the LORD.
Blessed is the man
who makes the LORD his trust,
who does not turn to the proud,
to those who go astray after lies.
You have multiplied, O LORD my God,
Your wondrous deeds
and Your thoughts toward us;
none can compare with You.
if I would declare and speak of them,
they are more than can be numbered.
𝙍: You have multiplied your wondrous deeds, O LORD.
Sacrifice and offering You did not desire;
my ears You have opened.
Burnt offering and sin offering
You have not required.
Then I said, “Behold, I have come;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do Your will, O my God;
Your law is within my heart.”
I have proclaimed the glad news of righteousness in the great congregation;
behold, I have not restrained my lips,
O LORD, as You know.
I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart;
I have declared Your faithfulness and Your salvation;
I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth
from the great congregation.
𝙍: You have multiplied your wondrous deeds, O LORD.
Withhold not Your mercy from me, O LORD;
let Your lovingkindness and Your truth continually preserve me.
For innumerable evils have surrounded me;
my iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to look up;
they are more than the hairs of my head;
therefore my heart fails me.
Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me;
O LORD, make haste to help me.
Let them be ashamed and confounded together
who seek to snatch away my life;
let them be driven backward and dishonored
who desire my hurt.
Let them be appalled because of their shame
who say to me, “Aha, aha!”
𝙍: You have multiplied your wondrous deeds, O LORD.
Let all those who seek You
rejoice and be glad in You;
let those who love Your salvation say continually,
“The LORD be magnified!”
But I am poor and needy;
yet the LORD is mindful of me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
do not delay, O my God.
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.
𝙍: You have multiplied your wondrous deeds, O LORD.
Psalm prayer
Free us from our sins, God, and may our sacrifices be of praise to the glory of your Son, our Redeemer, Jesus Christ.
Psalm 41
𝙍: LORD, be merciful to me.
Blessed is he who considers the poor;
the LORD will deliver him in the day of trouble.
The LORD will preserve him and keep him alive,
and he will be blessed on the earth;
You will not deliver him to the will of his enemies.
The LORD will sustain him on his sickbed;
in his illness, You will restore him to health.
I said, “LORD, be merciful to me;
heal my soul, for I have sinned against You.”
𝙍: LORD, be merciful to me.
My enemies speak evil of me:
“When will he die, and his name perish?”
And if he comes to see me, he speaks vain words;
his heart gathers iniquity to itself;
when he goes out, he tells it.
All who hate me whisper together against me;
against me they devise my hurt.
They say, “An evil disease clings to him.
And now that he lies down, he will not rise again.”
Even my own familiar friend,
in whom I trusted, who ate of my bread,
has lifted up the heel against me.
𝙍: LORD, be merciful to me.
But You, O LORD, be gracious to me,
and raise me up, that I may repay them.
By this I know that You are well pleased with me:
because my enemy does not triumph over me.
As for me, You uphold me in my integrity,
and set me in Your presence forever.
Blessed be the LORD God of Israel,
from everlasting to everlasting.
Amen and Amen.
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.
𝙍: LORD, be merciful to me.
Psalm prayer
God our deliverer, raise up the poor and comfort the betrayed, through the one who for our sakes became poor and whose betrayal brought our salvation, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Old Testament reading
Genesis 45:16-28
When the news reached Pharaoh’s palace that Joseph’s brothers had come, it pleased Pharaoh and his servants. Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Say to your brothers, ‘Do this. Load your animals and go to the land of Canaan. Get your father and your households and come to me, and I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat the fat of the land.’
“You are also commanded to say, ‘Do this: Take your wagons out of the land of Egypt for your little ones and for your wives, and get your father and come. Also do not concern yourself with your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours.’ ”
So the sons of Israel did so, and Joseph gave them wagons, according to the commandment of Pharaoh, and gave them provisions for the journey. To each of them he gave a change of clothes, but he gave to Benjamin three hundred shekels of silver and five changes of clothes. To his father he sent the following: ten donkeys loaded with the best things of Egypt and ten female donkeys loaded with grain and bread and provisions for his father on the journey. So he sent his brothers away, and they departed. He said to them, “Do not quarrel on the way.”
They went up out of Egypt and came to the land of Canaan to Jacob their father. They told him, “Joseph is still alive, and he is governor over all the land of Egypt.” And Jacob’s heart stood still because he could not believe them. They told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said to them, and when he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of their father Jacob revived. Then Israel said, “Enough! Joseph my son is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.”
Silence may be kept.
New Testament reading
Hebrews 3:7-19
Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says:
“Today, if you hear His voice,
do not harden your hearts
as in the rebellion,
on the day of temptation in the wilderness,
where your fathers tested Me and tried Me
and saw My works for forty years.
Therefore I was angry with that generation,
and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart,
and they have not known My ways.’
So I swore in My wrath,
‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ”
Be attentive, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, and you depart from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence firmly to the end, while it is said:
“Today, if you hear His voice,
do not harden your hearts
as in the rebellion.”
For who were they who heard and rebelled? Was it not all of those who came out of Egypt, led by Moses? And with whom was He grieved for forty years? Was it not with those who had sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who disobeyed? So we see that they could not enter because of unbelief.
Silence may be kept.
The Benedictus (The Song of Zechariah)
Luke 1:68-79
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for He has visited and redeemed His people,
and has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of His servant David,
as He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets of long ago,
that we should be saved from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us,
to perform the mercy promised to our fathers
and to remember His holy covenant,
the oath which He swore to our father Abraham,
to grant us that we, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies,
might serve Him without fear,
in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our lives.
And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest;
for you will go before the presence of the Lord to prepare His ways,
to give knowledge of salvation to His people
by the remission of their sins,
through the tender mercy of our God,
whereby the sunrise from on high has visited us;
to give light to those who sit in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.
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.
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.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He 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,
and is seated at the
right hand of the Father.
He 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.
Intercession and thanksgiving
Prayers may be offered for:
the day and its tasks
the world and its needs
the Church and her life
Prayers may include the following concerns:
Those preparing for baptism and confirmation
Those serving through leadership
Those looking for forgiveness
Those misled by the false gods of this present age
All who are hungry
Other intercessions and supplications may be offered as the Holy Spirit leads.
Response
In faith we pray
We pray to you, our God.
Silence may be kept.
Collect of the day
Almighty God, you show to those who are in error the light of your truth, that they may return to the way of righteousness: grant to all those who are admitted into the fellowship of Christ's religion, that they may reject those things that are contrary to their profession, and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same; through our Lord Jesus Christ, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
Amen.
The Lord’s Prayer
Trusting in the compassion of God, as our Savior taught us, so we pray
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. Amen.
Conclusion
May God our Redeemer show us compassion and love.
Amen.