Prayer XXI
O Lord our God, we have not only to look to Thee for answers but also for supplications; and we beseech Thee that Thou wouldst move upon our hearts, and draw our desires away from vanities to fix them upon Thyself. We would seek most earnestly for the highest things, we would desire Thy best gifts most, and we beseech Thee that Thou wouldst listen and wouldst help us.
Set us free, O Lord, from the deceits and shows of Time. Deliver us from, our tendencies to idolatry of the things seen and temporal, and from the fault which we are so prone to commit of setting the creature on the throne of the Creator, and diverting from Thee to it our love and admiration and our longing and trust.
We beseech Thee that Thou wouldst help us in our public worship. We know that if we regard iniquity in our hearts the Lord will not hear us. But though we are conscious of much that is contrary to Thy holy will, yet we bless Thee that we too can say ‘Blessed be God which hath not turned away my prayer nor His mercy from me.’ O Lord! Thou art near us, we believe, and Thou wilt help us. We would bring ourselves to Thee, and submit ourselves to Thy dealings, to the touches of Thy grace, and the monitions of Thy providence; and beseech Thee that one and the other may be blessed in order to bring us all nearer to Thyself, and to draw us away from the vanities of life.
O Lord! cleanse our hearts, we beseech Thee, and plant within them, dominant and deep, the highest principles of Thy Revelation, the greatest truths of Thy grace, Thy own sweetness and all-sufficiency manifested in Jesus Christ our Saviour. And grant that we may not be disobedient to the heavenly vision, but since Thou dost deign to reveal Thyself to us may our hearts be ever drawn towards that great light, and following it may we not walk in darkness, but evermore have the light that guides and leads to life. We beseech Thee to cleanse our evil, to forgive our sins, to disclose to us by that candle of the Lord which searcheth the inmost secrets of the heart all the lurking evils of which we ourselves may be unaware.
though they may be monstrous and plain to others. We ask for self-knowledge; we pray that Thou wouldst teach us what we are; that Thou wouldst teach us, too, what we may become; and we beseech Thee that Thy good Spirit in us may keep us from self-complacency and from despair, and show us plainly all that we ought not to be, and all that we ought to be. We ask Thee to forgive; we ask Thee to strengthen, to confirm, to settle, to ennoble us. And we cast our hopes and confidence upon Thee, since we bring our prayer through Him in Whom Thou hast shown us what is Thy will for the world; and by Whose sacrifice our sins can all be taken away, and through the spirit of Whose life we too may live free from condemnation and die to sin.
We beseech Thee, then, to draw near to us this morning, and to bless each of us according to our several parts in this service. We thank Thee that Thou dost permit us thus to gather ourselves together. We pray that our assembling may never be for the worse; always for the better. Let Thy grace descend upon us now, O Lord, and may we find that it is no vain thing to call upon the Lord.
Hear us; accept our thanks for Thy wondrous mercy; teach us the thankfulness that shall ever come back to give glory to God when we find ourselves suddenly possessed of great blessings, or delivered from great evils. And in all time of our tribulation, in all time of our wealth, when we are planning and purposing, when we are full of hope and anticipation, when we are struggling with the difficulties of realisation, when we are sorrowing over the irrevocable past. In all times help us to come near to Thee, in Whom all changing circumstances may be harmonised and made blessed, and Who alone changest never, but art the same Friend and Helper of us all. We beseech Thee to hear us, to grant us Thy blessing in our worship this morning, and to accept and answer us, through Christ our Saviour.