God our creator who goes before us
You draw us forward in faith
Like a pillar of fire across desert wastes
A rock of assurance
As we journey
Speak to us with your words of comfort and wisdom.
Prayer of confession
God of love and forgiveness
Save us by your tenderness
From each deed that is destructive
From each act that grieves you
From each thought that is careless
From each idea that is unloving
From each word that hurts.
Help us to face up to your call on our lives, by creating love and
goodness, community, society where it has been broken. In Jesus Name, Amen.
The Lord’s Prayer in our own language
Psalm 102
For my days pass away like smoke,
and my bones burn like a furnace.
4 My heart is stricken and withered like grass;
I am too wasted to eat my bread.
5 Because of my loud groaning
my bones cling to my skin.
6 I am like an owl of the wilderness,
like a little owl of the waste places.
7 I lie awake;
I am like a lonely bird on the housetop.
8 All day long my enemies taunt me;
those who deride me use my name for a curse.
9 For I eat ashes like bread,
and mingle tears with my drink,
10 because of your indignation and anger;
for you have lifted me up and thrown me aside.
11 My days are like an evening shadow;
I wither away like grass.
Our prayers for our Covid world, and for Yemen, Myanmar, China, Hong Kong, Nigeria, Belarus, Russia, US, UK, UAE, Ethiopia, Syria, Iran, Brazil, our own country, climate change, doctors and nurses, carers, teachers, those confronting injustice, our families and friends and ourselves…
May God’s hand be upon us, your angels protect us and the Holy Spirit work in and around us. Amen
Song “I shall not want”
Blessing
Loving God help us to follow you
Into a place of quietness,
Where we may face beasts and wilderness
But we will know the presence of angels
Even in the desert times. Amen.
