Thank you, O God, for this day.
Your day.
The LORD's day.
A time to worship you … to get our house in order.
The LORD's Day …
It’s not about us, and it feels right and good, to step aside from ourselves.
We’re tired of our self-absorption, O God.
Deliver us, we pray, from our little worlds of me and mine.
Retool our hearts with your Holy Spirit …
Conform us to the image of Christ.
Forgive our sins.
Restore us … refresh us … and send us into your world with healing for the nations …
And give us, we pray, a full and joyful measure of your Holy Spirit.
Creator of the heavens and the earth,
We thank you.
For the wonders of our planet.
The birds of the air and the fish of the sea.
All creatures, great and small.
For you made and love them all.
Grant us, we pray, kindness toward nature.
Forgive the greed that rips a rain forest to shreds.
The thoughtlessness that fills the seas with garbage.
The manipulation of soil with pesticides and herbicides.
The cruelty of industrial farming.
Filling the food chain with hormones and antibiotics and strange chemicals, altering the shape of life, in ways we do not know.
With your Spirit, O God, give us good eyes, eyes to see the natural around us … the beauty of the sky and the delicate curve of a gull’s wing … the power of the wolf and the innocence of the lamb.
Give us ears to hear the birds of dawn as they greet the day with joyful song, and from them, O God, teach us to greet the day with song, giving thanks for our lives, and trusting you to provide what’s needed every day of life … all the way to eternity.
Give us, we pray, a sense of balance.
It’s not about us.
It’s about your world.
Nor what we want.
But what we need.
And we need you.
We need a finer compassion and a richer love.
Our hearts need to be fleshed out with Christ.
Thank you, Dear God,
For friends and family.
For pets and gardens.
For pots and pans.
For salt and pepper and oregano and rosemary and thyme and coriander.
Thank you for a good bottle of wine.
And good music.
And faith, hope and love.
And thank you, most of all, for Jesus our LORD.
Who taught us to pray, saying:
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done …
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