Thu. morning Sep. 17
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
The Old Rugged Cross
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 37
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
Fret not because of evildoers,
nor be envious of the workers of iniquity.
For they will soon fade like the grass,
and wither like the green herb.
Trust in the LORD, and do good;
dwell in the land, and shepherd faithfulness.
Delight yourself in the LORD,
and He will give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the LORD;
trust also in Him, and He will bring it to pass.
He will bring forth your righteousness as the light,
and your justice as the noonday.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for Him;
fret not because of those who prosper in their way,
because of those who bring wicked schemes to pass.
Let go of anger and forsake wrath;
fret not—it leads only to evil.
For evildoers shall be cut off,
but those who wait on the LORD shall inherit the earth.
Yet a little while, and the wicked will be no more;
though you look diligently for his place, he will not be there.
But the meek shall inherit the land,
and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
The wicked plots against the righteous,
and gnashes his teeth at him.
The Lord laughs at him,
for He sees that his day is coming.
The wicked have drawn the sword
and have bent their bows,
to cast down the poor and needy,
and to slay those who walk uprightly.
Their sword shall enter their own heart,
and their bows shall be broken.
Better is a little that the righteous man has
than the abundance of many wicked.
For the arms of the wicked shall be broken,
but the LORD upholds the righteous.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
The LORD knows the days of the blameless,
and their heritage will abide forever.
They shall not be ashamed in evil times,
and in the days of famine they shall have abundance.
But the wicked shall perish,
and the enemies of the LORD, like the glory of the meadows,
shall vanish; like smoke they shall vanish away.
The wicked borrows and does not repay,
but the righteous is generous and gives.
For those blessed by Him shall inherit the earth,
but those cursed by Him shall be cut off.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
The steps of a man are made firm by the LORD
when He delights in his way.
Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down,
for the LORD upholds him with His hand.
I have been young, and now am old;
yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken,
nor his descendants begging bread.
The righteous is ever generous and lends,
and his descendants become a blessing.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
Depart from evil, and do good;
so shall you abide forever.
For the LORD loves justice,
and does not forsake His saints;
they are preserved forever,
but the descendants of the wicked shall be cut off.
The righteous shall inherit the land,
and live in it forever.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom,
and his tongue speaks justice.
The law of his God is in his heart;
none of his steps shall slip.
The wicked watches the righteous,
and seeks to kill him.
The LORD will not abandon him to his power,
or let him be condemned when he is judged.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
Wait on the LORD,
and keep His way,
and He will exalt you to inherit the land;
when the wicked are cut off, you will look on.
I have seen the wicked in great power,
and spreading himself like a luxuriant tree.
Yet he passed by, and behold, he was no more;
though I sought him, he could not be found.
Mark the blameless man, and behold the upright,
for there is a future for the man of peace.
𝙍: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
But the transgressors shall be destroyed together;
the future of the wicked shall be cut off.
But the salvation of the righteous is from the LORD;
He is their refuge in the time of trouble.
The LORD shall help them and deliver them;
He shall deliver them from the wicked,
and save them, because they take refuge in Him.
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: The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD.
Psalm prayer
Blessed and holy God, ever merciful and forgiving, may we turn from what is evil and do what is good in your sight, for you have saved us by the cross of your Son, our Savior Jesus Christ.
Old Testament reading
1 Kings 11:1-13
But King Solomon loved many foreign women in addition to the daughter of Pharaoh, women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites, from the nations which the LORD warned the Israelites about, saying, “You shall not go in to them, nor shall they come in to you, for they will surely turn your heart away toward their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love. He had seven hundred wives who were princesses and three hundred concubines, and his wives turned his heart away. For when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods, and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God as the heart of David his father had been. For Solomon went after Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Molech, the abomination of the Ammonites. Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and did not fully follow the LORD as his father David had done.
Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is close to Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the Ammonites. He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods.
The LORD was angry with Solomon because he turned his heart away from the LORD God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice, and had warned him about this, that he should not follow other gods, but he was disobedient to the LORD’s command. Therefore the LORD said to Solomon, “Since you have done this and have not kept My covenant and statutes, which I commanded you, I will surely take the kingdom from you and give it to your servant. I will not do this in your lifetime for your father David’s sake, but I will tear it out of the hand of your son. However, I will not take the whole kingdom away, but will preserve one tribe for your son for David My servant’s sake and for the sake of Jerusalem which I chose.”
Silence may be kept.
New Testament reading
Acts 17:16-34
While Paul waited for them in Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. Therefore he disputed in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there. Then some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What will this babbler say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods,” because he preached Jesus and the resurrection to them. They took hold of him and led him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is of which you speak? For you are bringing strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.” For all the Athenians and foreigners who lived there spent their time in nothing else, but either telling or hearing something new.
Then Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus, and said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. For as I passed by and looked up at your objects of worship, I found an altar with this inscription:
TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.
Therefore, whom you worship as unknown, Him I proclaim to you.
“God who made the world and all things in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by hands. Nor is He served by men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives all men life and breath and all things. He has made from one blood every nation of men to live on the entire surface of the earth, having appointed fixed times and the boundaries of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord so perhaps they might reach for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’
“Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to suppose that the Deity is like gold or silver or stone or an engraved work of art or an image of the reflection of man. God overlooked the times of ignorance, but now He commands all men everywhere to repent. For He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by a Man whom He has appointed, having given assurance of this to all men by raising Him from the dead.”
When they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some scoffed. But others said, “We will hear you again concerning this matter.” So Paul departed from them. However, some men joined him and believed. Among them were Dionysius, member of the Areopagus, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
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:
Local government, community leaders
All who provide local services
Those who work with young or elderly people
Schools, colleges, and universities
Emergency and rescue organizations
Other intercessions and supplications may be offered as the Holy Spirit leads.
Response
Lord, hear your people
and answer our prayers.
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, 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.