Tue. morning Jun. 16
Opening response
O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
Prayer of thanksgiving
Blessed are you, Sovereign God, creator of all, to you be glory and praise forever. You founded the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands. In the fullness of time, you made us in your image, and in these last days you have spoken to us in your Son Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh. As we rejoice in the gift of your presence among us, let the light of your love always shine in our hearts, your Spirit ever renew our lives, and your praises ever be on our lips.
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
Breathe on Me, Breath of God
Confession of Sin
Come, Holy Spirit of God,
and search our hearts with the light of Christ.
Our Lord Jesus Christ said:
“The first of all the commandments is, ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
Amen. Lord, have mercy.
After a period of reflection
Come, let us return to the Lord and say:
Lord our God, in our sin, we have avoided your call. Our faithfulness is like a morning cloud, and like the early dew, it goes away. Have mercy on us; deliver us from judgment; bind up our wounds and revive us; in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
cf Hosea 6
May Almighty God, who sent his Son into the world to save sinners, bring us his pardon and peace, now and forever.
Amen.
Psalm 48
𝙍: We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God.
Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God, in His holy mountain.
Beautiful in elevation,
the joy of the whole earth,
is Mount Zion on the sides of the north,
the city of the great King.
Within her citadels God is known
as a refuge.
𝙍: We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God.
For behold, the kings assembled;
they passed by together.
They saw it, and so they were astounded;
they were troubled; they took to flight.
Trembling took hold of them there,
and pain, as of a woman in labor,
as when You break the ships of Tarshish
with an east wind.
As we have heard,
so have we seen
in the city of the Lord of Hosts,
in the city of our God;
God will establish it forever.
𝙍: We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God.
We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God,
in the midst of Your temple.
According to Your name, O God,
so is Your praise to the ends of the earth;
Your right hand is full of righteousness.
Let Mount Zion rejoice;
let the daughters of Judah be glad,
because of Your judgments.
Walk about Zion, and go all around her;
count her towers;
mark well her bulwarks;
go through her citadels,
that you may tell the next generation
that this is God, our God forever and ever;
He will be our guide 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.
𝙍: We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God.
Psalm Prayer
Father of lights, raise us with Christ to your eternal city, that, with kings and nations, we may wait in the midst of your temple and see your glory forever and ever.
Psalm 52
𝙍: I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever.
Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?
The goodness of God endures continually.
Your tongue devises destruction,
like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.
You love evil more than good,
and lying rather than speaking what is right.
You love all devouring words,
O you deceitful tongue.
But God will break you down forever;
He will snatch you away and pluck you from your home,
and uproot you from the land of the living.
The righteous will see and fear,
and will laugh at him, saying,
“Behold, the man
who did not make God his refuge,
but trusted in the abundance of his riches,
and sought refuge in his wickedness.”
But I am like a green olive tree
in the house of God;
I trust in the mercy of God
forever and ever.
I will give You thanks forever for what You have done.
In the presence of Your saints I will wait on Your name,
for it is good.
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: I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever.
Psalm prayer
Faithful and steadfast God, nourish your people in this wicked world, and, through prayer and the Scriptures, give us our daily bread; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Old Testament reading
Judges 4:1-23
When Ehud was dead, the Israelites once more did what was evil in the sight of the LORD. The LORD sold them into the hands of King Jabin of Canaan, who ruled in Hazor. The commander of his army was Sisera. He lived in Harosheth Haggoyim. The Israelites cried out to the LORD, for Sisera had nine hundred iron chariots and had forcefully oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.
Now Deborah, the wife of Lappidoth, was a prophetess. She judged Israel at that time. She would sit under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim. The Israelites would go up to her for her to render judgment. She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, “The LORD God of Israel commands you, ‘Go and deploy troops at Mount Tabor, and take ten thousand men from the tribes of Naphtali and Zebulun with you. I will draw Sisera, the commander of the army of Jabin, with his chariots and large army to you at the River Kishon and give him into your hands.’ ”
Barak said to her, “If you will go with me, then I will go, but if you will not go with me, then I will not go.”
She said, “I will indeed go with you. However, the way you are going will gain you no glory, for the LORD will deliver Sisera into the hand of a woman.” Then Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh. Barak called Zebulun and Naphtali to Kedesh. Ten thousand men went up on foot with him, and Deborah went up with him also.
Now Heber the Kenite had moved away from the Kenites, who were descendants of Hobab, Moses’ father-in-law. He pitched his tent at the oak in Zaanannim, near Kedesh.
Then they told Sisera that Barak son of Abinoam had gone up to Mount Tabor. So Sisera summoned all his nine hundred iron chariots and all the people with him, from Harosheth Haggoyim to the River Kishon.
Then Deborah said to Barak, “Get up, for this is the day that the LORD has given Sisera into your hands. Has not the LORD gone out before you?” So Barak went down from Mount Tabor with ten thousand men behind him. The LORD routed Sisera and all of his chariots and all of his army with the edge of the sword in front of Barak. Sisera dismounted his chariot and fled on foot.
Barak chased after the chariots and the army as far as Harosheth Haggoyim. The whole army of Sisera fell by the edge of the sword. Not a single man survived. Sisera fled on foot to the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, for there was peace between King Jabin of Hazor and the family of Heber the Kenite.
Jael went out to meet Sisera and said to him, “Turn aside, my lord. Turn aside to me. Do not be afraid.” So he turned aside to her into the tent, and she covered him with a rug.
He said to her, “Please give me a little water to drink, for I am thirsty.” So she opened a leather milk container, gave it to him to drink, and covered him.
He said to her, “Stand in the entrance to the tent, and if anyone comes and asks you, ‘Is there a man here?’ then you say, ‘No.’ ”
Then Jael the wife of Heber took a tent peg and a hammer in her hand and went quietly to him, for he was fast asleep and tired. She drove the tent peg into his temple, and it went down into the ground, so he died.
And behold, as Barak was pursuing Sisera, Jael came out to meet him and said, “Come, and I will show you the man whom you seek.” When he came in, there was Sisera fallen dead with a tent peg in his temple.
So God humbled King Jabin of Canaan before the Israelites that day.
Silence may be kept.
New Testament reading
Luke 13:10-21
He was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity for eighteen years and was bent over and could not straighten herself up. When Jesus saw her, He called her and said to her, “Woman, you are loosed from your infirmity.” Then He laid His hands on her, and immediately she was made straight and glorified God.
But the ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation, because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, and said to the people, “There are six days in which men ought to work. Therefore come and be healed on those days, but not on the Sabbath day.”
The Lord then answered him and said, “You hypocrite! Does not each one of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the stall and lead it away to water it? Then should not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham whom Satan has bound these eighteen years, be loosed from this bondage on the Sabbath?”
When He said this, all His adversaries were ashamed. And all the people rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by Him.
Then He said, “What is the kingdom of God like? To what shall I compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took and planted in his garden. It grew and became a large tree, and the birds of the air nested in its branches.”
Again He said, “To what shall I compare the kingdom of God? It is like yeast, which a woman took and hid in sixty pounds of meal until all of it was leavened.”
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:
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, in your mercy
hear our prayer.
Silence may be kept.
Collect of the day
Lord, you have taught us that all our doings without love are worth nothing: send your Holy Spirit and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of love, the true bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whoever lives is counted dead before you. Grant this for your only Son Jesus Christ's sake, 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, 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
The Lord bless us, and preserve us from all evil, and keep us in eternal life.
Amen.