Prayers for Sunday December 10, 2000
Second Sunday of Advent

Invocation or Call to Worship

We have come this morning O Lord, because you have already come to us. We come to You in hopes of coming not only closer to You in our daily lives, but also we come to You in hopes of being closer to one another. We come in thanks for Your coming and come in thanks for Your constant presence in our lives. Amen.

Prayer of Confession

We confess that we overlook too many crooked roads. We fail to make straight the paths of those in need. We fail to help those who need a minute of our time so that we can help sooth their minds and straighten their spirits. We confess that we take the easy but always crooked path when helping others. We leave nameless souls with a few empty words. We know that our souls are made crooked by our fear of being made a fool or being harmed. Please O God, help us to straighten out the roads we travel along in hopes of celebrating the straight path You have given us. Amen.

Prayer of Dedication

O God we fail to take just a moment as we drive to work or get ready for school or prepare for the day, to breath in the newness of Your Creation each morning. Let us look out our windows and see the beauty of Your hills the vastness of Your plains. We come to thank You for the sweet morning air and the possibilities of not only a new day, but the possibilities of tomorrow. Amen.

Pastoral Prayer (based on Philippians text)

We have come to thank You our God. We come in joy. We come in hope. We come as witnesses to Jesus Christ. We come as sharers of grace. We come to confirm the Good News in our lives. We come in the love of God which grows and grows.

We come to celebrate what is excellent in our lives. We come to celebrate what is pure and blameless in our lives. We come to celebrate Jesus Christ. We come filled with the joy of the fruits which comes through Jesus Christ.

We come to remind ourselves that Jesus has come and that he will come again. We come out of love. We come to hear again the words of hope of John the Baptist. We come knowing the joy that those words have brought to our world for over two thousand years. We come and go full of the joy of knowing that Jesus Christ has come to show us that God is among us. Amen.