The prophet Isaiah told of one who was coming who would bring comfort to a world in agony. He spoke of a future voice in the wilderness who would cry out, “Prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.” And so John the Baptist came, and following him Jesus, Ever since, the world has not been the same. We gather together to praise the God who made these things possible. Therefore let us with Advent confidence worship God.
Pastoral Prayer
We thank Thee, O God, for the Coming One, the Promised One, for the Word made flesh, for Yeshua ha-Notzri, for Jesus the Nazarene. We thank Thee for the transforming message he has brought with him into the world, whereby the spiritually blind see and the mentally lame walk and those who have been deaf to nuance suddenly hear. We praise Thee that because of Jesus, we have been brought into Thy kingdom, there to gain a foretaste of the messianic banquet to come. Enlarge our hearts and minds to receive as much of the Good News of Jesus Christ of which we are capable of grasping. And when that happens, make us agents of the expansion of Thy kingdom on behalf of others.
We thank Thee for the singular beauty of the place in which we are blessed to live: for low waves rolling in from the great expanse of the sea onto a beach of very finely-ground sand; for bald eagles and ospreys circling overhead, and brown pelicans crashing comically into the water in search of their breakfast; for deer and squirrels and rabbits and opossums and raccoons sharing their natural environment with the likes of us; for the feathery majesty of hooded mergansers slowly swimming on a quiet lagoon as though it is their own, which, to their way of thinking, it is. When we see the glory that surrounds us, help us even more to perceive the glory of the One who created all of it.
We pray for people who are recovering from a virulent virus which have threatened their health; for those who are recovering from mental or circumstantial assaults which have shaken their confidence in Thee or in themselves; for those whose marriages have disintegrated and who feel at a loss to move forward in any direction; for those whose marriages have been terminated by death, and who feel lost and lonely in a manner they have never before experienced. Lord God, our needs are great, but Thine ability to meet those needs is far greater still. Help us to live in faith when human certainly is cast adrift. These things we ask in the name of our Messiah, Jesus Christ, the most unique of all Thy sons and daughters. Now we pray together as he taught us, saying, Our Father….