Liturgies continue

Call to Worship (Based on Psalm 118 )

Pastor: Give thanks to the Lord, for God is good.

People: God’s steadfast love endures forever!

Pastor: Be in awe of the wonders of God.

People: God’s steadfast love endures forever!

Pastor: Take refuge in God, rather than worldly princes.

People: God’s steadfast love endures forever!

Pastor: The Lord is our strength and our might. God is our salvation.

People: God’s steadfast love endures forever!

Invocation

Loving and gracious God, you are more than we can imagine. Help us to see your wondrous and diverse ways. Open us to the many ways that you make yourself known. Teach us to be generous and hospitable. In you and through you we seek to find our sacred center so that we can better walk in the footprints that your son first set. Give us hearts of compassion and spirits of courage as we work to bring to fruition your vision of heaven on earth. AMEN

Pastoral Prayer

Holy and Gracious God, 

Your compassion is extravagant.

When your son came to show us what your love looked like in action,

We saw him care for all no matter their position or circumstances.

We watched him let interruptions become purposeful interactions.

We noticed how he took time to learn people’s names

And gather close to him those others had pushed away or ignored.

We remember his words even to the thief crucified beside him,

“Today you will be with me in paradise.”

To him no difference was too vast, no border too impenetrable, no person was unworthy.

Let us today pray for the vision you cast through your son.

Let us pray for people who are without homes and are left sleeping on the streets.

Let us pray for the people who will go without their HIV protocols because of bureaucratic savings.

Let us pray for people we pass everyday that don’t know where or how they will pay the rent or get food to feed their families.

Let us pray for the growing lines at the food pantry.

Let us pray for those who walk thousands of miles to seek hope

And for those in Gaza being squeezed harder and harder into smaller and smaller spaces.

Let us pray for those who are detained and incarcerated without proper due process.

Let us pray for the battered areas in our world that fade from our news cycles.

Let us pray for those imprisoned,

Those in recovery,

Those seeking help for physical and emotional suffering.

Let us open our hearts and offer to God all of those who we know to need God’s balm and care today:

God in your compassion gather your chicks under your breast and give them a safe place to rest. Infuse your love in the form of justice into the wider world encouraging us all to step in and heal the hurting as we can, where we can, when we can.

We pray this in the name of your son, and our brother, who taught us so well and who shared with us this prayer which we say together now:

Followed by the Lord’s prayer