Prayer For Third Sunday Of Advent
Loving Father, keep your Church faithful in telling the good news, loving, justice and drawing many to freedom through the joy of your forgiveness.
We pray, Lord for our work and witness for you here at St Marks. Will you bless strengthen and encourage our clery Charlie, Sam and Jane and all who minister in so many ways. We ask your special blessing on the nativities this week at Pre-school and Messy Church and our Carols in the Car Park that in all the enjoyment the amazing message of you coming to dwell with us in love will shine through to all who come.
Lord in your love
Hear our prayer
We pray particularly for the elderly this Christmas time- especially in Care Homes,
We pray for our ministry in Lady Laude and Anjulita Court, Highfields and
Sir William Harpur House and for Friends for Life that love and compassion may be spread abroad to bring comfort and hope.
Lord in your love
Hear our prayer
We pray for our world that there may be integrity in leadership, mercy and justice for rich and poor, strong and weak; that there may be peace among nations and respect for all. We ask your wisdom for those battling to solve economic problems in the Eurozone; for those seeking new ways ahead- North Africa & Russia for those trying to bring agreement and justice in the climate talks South Africa and those grappling with the continued violence in Afghanistan.
For our broken, fragile world that you love and seek to redeem.
Lord in your love
Hear our prayer
We pray, Lord, for our community, our families and friends for their hopes and fears. May the love of Christ be shown in what we do and how we speak. We remember now all those we know in special need locked in physical and emotional pain; all weighed down with worry or despair. God of Advent hope, will you restore and replenish them, comfort and free them.
Lord in your love
Hear our prayer
Finally, loving Father, we commend to your love those who have died. Loved ones we especially miss at this time whose memory are treasure. May they, and we in our turn, experience for ever the joy of your eternity.
Jesus Christ is the light of the world, a light which our darkness can quench. So as we commend to your everlasting love those who have died we light a candle to symbolise the light of Christ which eternally shines and brings hope. Today we remember
Eddie MacKenzie .
You turn our darkness into light; in your light shall we see light.
Merciful Father,
Accept these prayers for the sake of your Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ.
Amen
Show us, O Lord, Thy mercy, and grant us Thy salvation.... Mercy and faithfulness shall unite; justice and peace shall embrace. Faithfulness shall sprout from the earth, and justice shall look down from heaven. The Lord will also give prosperity, and our land shall yield its produce. Justice shall go before Him, and salvation in His footsteps.
O God of the exiles and the lost,
you promise restoration and wholeness
through the power of Jesus Christ.
Give us faith to live joyfully,
sustained by your promises
as we eagerly await the day when they will be fulfilled
for all the world to see,
through the coming of your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen.
God of hope,
you call us home from the exile of selfish oppression
to the freedom of justice,
the balm of healing,
and the joy of sharing.
Make us strong to join you in your holy work,
as friends of strangers and victims,
companions of those whom others shun,
and as the happiness of those whose hearts are broken.
We make our prayer through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
O Almighty God, gracious provider and giver of life, we anxiously await the celebration of your birth. Like the people of long ago, our ancestors in faith, we, too, are in need of light, in need of direction, in need of your Word, to show us the way. Our busy lives and the consumerism that surrounds us make it difficult to recognize your kingdom and to hear your voice. Help us Lord, to focus on you. Amen.
Incline Thine ear to our prayers, O Lord, we beseech Thee; and make bright the darkness of our minds by the grace of Thy visitation. Who livest and reignest, with God the Father, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.
I lift my heart up to you, Lord,
to thank you for the blessings
you shower on me each day.
You are the 'joy of my soul.'
I know that in your great love,
I am held and protected by you.
I pray and listen to the good news you send;
I ask and feel the healing.
I am freed by you
from the things in this world
that let me hide from you.
I rejoice, I rejoice, down to my soul.
Help me to prepare my heart
to be open and able to receive your immense love.
May the Lord bless us,
protect us from all evil
and bring us to everlasting life.
Amen.
O God, who see how your people
faithfully await the feast of the Lord's Nativity,
enable us, we pray,
to attain the joys of so great a salvation,
and to celebrate them always
with solemn worship and glad rejoicing.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.