There is an old saying that life is what happens to us after we have made all our plans. As the poet said, the best-laid plans o’ mice and men gang aft agley. How we deal with what happens to us largely determines how we deal with life. Worship offers us an opportunity each week to ponder anew how God blesses us and is present with us in every experience of our lives. In light of that claim, let us therefore, with confidence, worship God!
Pastoral Prayer
Gracious and loving God, Thou hast created the universe and everything in it with a goodness of purpose and intention. We too are the recipients of that goodness and good intention, and for it we give Thee thanks and praise. But we also are aware, sometimes painfully so, that things happen over which we have no control, nor dost Thou intervene to prevent them. We ask Thee to help us to deal as positively and fruitfully as we can with all the vicissitudes of our lives, and to realize it is Thy will to assist us to respond as favorably as possible to whatever comes our way. Keep us from supposing either that we are totally on our own in life or that Thou art the one whose intention it is to place constant roadblocks in our path.
We pray for those whose roadblocks seem so frequent or large or insurmountable that they are stymied in how to proceed with their lives. We remember all who are regularly afflicted by depression, those who must bear physical or psychological or spiritual pain on a continuous basis, those whose lives have been shattered by the ending of a close relationship and who do not where or to whom to turn. Be with the victims of natural or man-made disasters, the victims of personal abuse by others, and the victims of their own minds when their biggest perception is that they are always victimized, even when that conviction does not match reality.
Lord God, we pray also for those whose primary service to Thee is through service to others. Uphold them in their daily labors. Be with teachers, nurses, doctors, other medical personnel, ministers, priests, rabbis, imams and other religious officials, with social workers and aid providers and caregivers. Grant renewed strength to the weary, renewed hope to the dispirited, and renewed dedication to the wavering. All these things we pray in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, who has been the primary guide into our relationship with Thee, and who, for us, has personified a human face for Thy face. Now we pray together as Jesus taught his followers, saying, Our Father….