Hope Church Prayer Book seeks to promote a worship culture from Monday to Saturday by conveying worship resources from Sundays. Worship is not a thought, but an action; not a concept, but a practice. And the more we practice, the more in shape we get - in the shape of Jesus. So sing out loud or read a responsive prayer before dinner. Each month’s prayer book will now be available on Hope’s website under the resources tab!
New Years is a fine holiday, but let’s face it: August is the beginning of the functional year, when society truly restarts. It’s when school’s get back up and running and the church ministry year truly gets under way. Different industries have different busy seasons, but August is for everyone. And everyone needs a good recentering – a good reminder – of why we do all we’re about to do. That’s why we have Week of Waiting, to stop and re-depend on God. We encourage you to use the items in this month’s prayer book to do just that.
Calls to Worship
Outside the Sunday morning service, these can serve as great devotional practices, great ways to re-depend on God for the day ahead. Tip: when it says out loud, say it out loud, no matter where you are. The difference in those moments is like the difference between the idea of a hug and an actual hug. And when it says LEADER/ALL, this is a great opportunity to practice in a small group or family devotional.
Unmediated Experience
I’ve recently been thinking about all the ways in which my sense of reality has been mediated for me. –Mediated by our culture, our technology, and by people who’ve been influential in my life. “Mediate” comes from a word that means “middle”. – So something that mediates our experience is something that stands in the middle, between us and reality as God has revealed it.
And in the various traditions of Christian faith, even the experience of God can be positioned as a more or less mediated experience. And while first Timothy assures us there is only one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ, I’ve come to realize how much I actually seek out other mediators – in the form of small groups, preaching, worship music, Christian books… — All of the things that would serve me a comfortable, curated “experience” of God.
But that’s not why we gather on any given Sunday.
We have the option of an unmediated experience of God’s generosity toward us. He has offered His very self, freely, and directly, if we will just meet with Him in the sanctuary of our hearts. This is a gift we may struggle to take hold of while we’re embracing our mediators of choice. But let’s seek Him with our whole hearts this morning, look past those things, and worship Him together.
Task oriented
Psalm 34:1-3
I will bless the LORD at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul makes its boast in the LORD;
let the humble hear and be glad.
Oh, magnify the LORD with me,
and let us exalt his name together!
We are living in a state-oriented culture over-against a task-oriented one. If we are hungry, we can’t learn. If we are triggered, we can’t show up to work on time. If we are traumatized, we can’t be expected to treat our coworkers amicably. We have an allergy to tasks, as if doing something out of duty is less important than doing something out of passion. This is our individualistic culture talking
But tasks give us purpose, meaning, trajectory; Just watch the happiness quotient of our families go up this month as kids go back to school and have to show up everyday and do stuff! Tasks are good! And the best task on earth is praise. I will bless the Lord at all times, regardless of my state and dependent on His. His praise shall continually be in my mouth, because He is continually worthy of it. So, we’ve got a job to do, and let’s start by declaring this passage out loud
I will bless the LORD at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul makes its boast in the LORD;
let the humble hear and be glad.
Oh, magnify the LORD with me,
and let us exalt his name together!
Prayers
Generosity Prayer
ALL
Holy Father, there is nothing I have that You have not given me. All I have and am belong to You, bought with the blood of Jesus. To spend everything on myself, and to give without sacrifice, is the way of the world that You cannot abide.
LEADER
But generosity is the way of those who call Christ their Lord; who love Him with free hearts and serve Him with renewed minds. Who withstand the delusion of riches that chokes the Word; Whose hearts are in your kingdom and not in the systems of the world.
ALL
I am determined to increase in generosity until it can be said that there is no needy person among us. I am determined to be trustworthy with such a little thing as money that You may trust me with true riches. Above all, I am determined to be generous because You, Father, are generous.
LEADER
It is the delight of Your daughters and sons to share Your traits, and to show what You are like to all the world.
Amen.
Now, let us take a brief moment of silence to ponder those ways in which God may be calling us to give generously of our resources
Prayers for Those Gone Astray
We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way
-Isaiah 53:6
Today we are going to pray for those in our church, our city, our country and our world who have “gone astray” from God.
As we pray for these different groups of people, when you hear me say “Father God,” I invite you to join by praying “draw them to yourself.”
Jesus, Head of the Church, we pray for those who gather in churches today, here and around the world, whose hearts are far from you. Those who come out of obligation and pride; who put trust in their own religious practices, but not in you. Lord, would you wake up those who are Christian in name only, and lead them to true faith in you. Free them of the burden they carry – to earn their own salvation – and remind us all that you have carried that burden fully. Soften their hearts to receive the gift you offer us, and lead them from a life of obligation to a life of joy in relationship with you.
Father God, draw them to yourself.
God of truth, we pray for those here and around the world who have chosen to follow other ideologies. It’s not that other ideologies have no truth in them, but today we pray for those who have put whole trust in partial truths: For those who have put their trust in politics, release them from oversimplifying the world around them; for those who have put their trust in other religions, lead them away from a set of rules, and into a relationship with you; for those who have put their trust in their studies, humble them to see the limits of their knowledge; for those who give their allegiance to certain people and leaders, teach them what it means to love their neighbor as themselves, but to love you and only you as God.
Father God, draw them to yourself.
Good Shepherd, we pray for those who have been misled by people who seek to do harm for self-gain; for the vulnerable in our world who are desperate…whether because of personal circumstances, or lack of resources, or isolation from community. We pray that you would give clarity and strength to resist the lies being told them, that you would surround them with people who love them and care for them, that you would provide for their needs, and that you would reassure them of their sense of self.
Father God, draw them to yourself.
Master Healer, we pray for those who wander because they have been hurt by the church. We lament that – in some cases – true harm has been done…abuse of power, manipulation, gas lighting. In other cases, we recognize that life in community can be messy, and even when there aren’t bad intentions, we can hurt each other. We pray for you to heal those wounds. We pray that you would mend broken hearts. We pray for reconciliation and restored relationships. We pray that you would remove those with evil intentions from positions of authority and lead them to repentance.
Father God, draw them to yourself.
God of grace, we know in our hearts that we are all prone to wander: to try and satisfy ourselves with things and people and success and philosophies. Pour out your Spirit on us afresh today, that we may taste and see that you are good, and satisfy us with your good grace. Amen
Commissionings
We regularly send workers from common fields into their professions with a renewed sense of divine calling. As you read this prayer, prayer it over an educator you know and be thinking about how you can adapt prayers like these to yours or other professions.
Educator Commissioning
The way we work is an important ministry front of the Church; it’s one of the main ways the members of our community can get a good picture of what it might actually look like if they became a Christian someday. We serve a God who uses His power for the sake of those who have none, and there is a particular group of people who reflect that divine virtue to a watching world: our educators. We we call them up, we lay our hands on them in prayer, and we send them deliberately into their careers (or as we call them in the church: their callings)
Lord, we lift up our educators! They are on the front lines of society. Their end product is not a cog or a machine, it is a mind, and they are molding it into a useful shape for society. Help them, first, to be reminded of the deep honor, privilege, and joy it is to do what they get to do with their lives. Second, reinvigorate them for the task. Give them fresh ideas, fresh compassion, and fresh drive to elevate these young people to a more noble state with a noble task: Life is what we make it as You are making us, God. Use these educators to make a better life, a better Albuquerque, a better society. Finally, help them overcome barriers of bureaucracy, to not take no for an answer when it comes to innovating for student success, and to empower kids to blow past barriers and not use them as excuses.
And for us as a church we pray for more and more partnerships between our community and those represented in schools like John Baker, Hoover, McKinley, SY Jackson, Eisenhower, and El Dorado. We pray for their principals Katie Sievert, Rebecca Sanchez, Jenna Bloodworth, Molly Keyes, Crystal Friedman, and Juan Dominguez-Torres. Give them wisdom to empower teachers to empower students, to navigate the system and reform it when and where they can, and to create cultures of excellence at their schools. Protect them and encourage them.
And finally we pause now and ask these educators to pray for their students.
…
Amen!
Confession and Assurance
Piston Confessional
I get this picture of the piston of a car engine when I think of confession. This cylinder of air and fuel is compressed, smashed with nowhere else to go, then a spark is introduced when the pressure is greatest, and the explosion sends the piston back up and cycles the engine forward. When we humble ourselves and confess real sins, embarrassing sins, the Holy Spirit applies the spark of God’s grace. So what our enemy would use as ammunition, our God uses it as propulsion.
ALL
Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done,
and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us;
that we may delight in your will,
and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your Name. Amen.
Baptisms
Baptisms are an ordinance. They are not merely a tradition of the church but a command of Jesus to strengthen the faith of believers by giving them a ritual by which they declare their official beginning as disciples. Witnessing these declarations reminds us all that our journey had a beginning and it takes us back to it. Like it says in Colossians 2:6-7
So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.
Take a moment to watch this baptism video from July 26th. If you think of it, pray for these new believers: that even as they grow, they would remain right where they started.
Benediction
Now, go forth into the world in peace.
Be of good courage.
Hold fast to that which is good.
Render to no one evil for evil, but overcome evil with good.
Support the weak; help the afflicted; honor all persons.
Love and serve the Lord, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.
And may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, the communion and fellowship of the Holy Spirit rest upon you and remain with you now and always.
