Call to Worship – January 3, 2016
Another year has passed, and another year has come. Our time is in God’s hands. We gather to give Him thanks for all the time we have had, and for whatever time we have left. We thank God for His care of us in good times and bad, in times both trying and triumphant. Everything we have is ultimately a gift from God, because He alone had created everything that is. Therefore, with gratitude, hope, and resolution for a new year, let us, with New Year’s confidence, worship God.
Pastoral Prayer
In gratitude we gather before Thee, Lord God of the universe, thanking Thee for all Thy blessings to us in the past year. We remember our families and friends, and how they have been a source of pleasure and support to us. We thank Thee for men and women who have provided leadership for us in government, business, education, medicine, and the Church. We recall research scientists and inventors who devote their lives to finding methods to improve the lives of everyone. It is Thy spirit moving within all of us that makes the world a better and more productive environment for all Thy children. Help us to maximize not only our own lives personally but also the lives of everyone on this planet, so that together we may reflect Thy will for Thy world.
We confess before Thee the ways in which individually and socially we have failed to live up to our potential. Too often we have put ourselves first, thinking too little of the welfare of others. Both knowingly and unknowingly some of us take advantage over others of us, and injustice and inequity is the result. Enable us to examine our lives more closely to see how we can improve life for those around us.
We ask Thy blessings to be with those who feel bereft of all blessings: the psychologically isolated, the mentally ill, the physically impaired, and the spiritually depleted. By Thy power becoming manifest in their lives, enable those who have given up on life to look once again to Thee, trusting that Thou wilt lift their spirits and their hopes in their time of trouble. We thank Thee for the light which flooded into the world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, and we ask that the joy and inspiration he gave to the people around him may pervade our lives and the life of everyone whom Thou hast welcomed into the worldwide fellowship of Christ’s Church. All our prayers we make in Jesus’ name. Now we pray together as he taught us, saying, Our Father….