2.4 KiB
Context
Scripture Reading: Mark 7:1-8
Sermon Text: Luke 11:37-54
Prayer
Father,
We come to You as a people that has scorned Your holy Name, if not with our lips, then certainly with our actions. We were born with hearts that hated You. We knew better than to oppose You openly. We knew that You are unassailable and all powerful, and that all Your enemies we be ground into dust. Knowing these things, we invented ways to disguise our hate as love. We believed our own lies and thereby we comforted ourselves. And perhaps we even impressed others. But You were never fooled by our ruse. Our hearts were indeed far from You.
For those of us who legitimately bear the name Christian, our greatest desire has been redirected to You, that we may love You truly. But in our flesh, we still desire many things inordinately and wrongly. We desire things that we should not. We esteem Your gifts more highly than You.
We are too often an ungrateful people. Even on our most thankful days, we take for granted more blessings than we could count.
We bend the truth. We lie both outright and subtly.
We have our own standards that fall far short of Your unapproachable holiness. We pretend our standard is Your standard. We replace Your Word with vain books and podcasts. With eloquent words of men, whether voluminous or brief, we sweep the parts Your Word that we do not like away to an obscure corner and meditate on it no more.
We esteem ourselves as living lives far more pleasing to You than we really do. We think our priorities are Your priorities, that our judgement is Your judgment. But our lives are stained tar black by sin. We sin in ways that seem small to us, but the natural consequences of which will be felt for generations to come in our families and in this church. Sins that we think nothing of today will make ruin of Your work here in generations to come.
Still, in spite of our sheer abhorrence before You, You love us. You are patient with us. Unapproachable holiness stoops down in love for those who hated Him. The unassailable One came in flesh to bear our guilt and pay its great price, to be mocked, beaten, torn, and pierced by lowly creatures, so the we, though mired in sin, might have our hearts brought near to You. Father please, help us to live lives pleasing to You in all ways, that our lives may more closely resemble the record bequeathed to us by Your Son.
It is in the name Your righteous Son, Christ Jesus that we pray. Amen.