CALL TO WORSHIP

 

Altar included faces of Seekers and people from around the world.

Leader:

Come, let us gather together to worship the God of all.

All:            
We look around.

Even though we’re very much alike,

We show different faces to the world.

 

Leader:      
Let us celebrate the rich wildness that is at the heart of God’s creation.

All:            
We are one part of the Body of Christ, gathered to worship God – Creator, Liberator and Holy Spirit.

 

 

INVOCATION

HYMN

SILENCE

RESPONSIVE READING

Leader:        We see faces in meditation,
                   a hundred faces carved above,
                   eye lines wrinkled in the hand held light.

Voice 1:       If only our own faces would allow the invisible carver’s hand
                   to bring the deep grain of love to the surface.

Voice 2:       If only we knew
                   as the carver knew, how the flaws
                   in the wood led his searching chisel to the very core.

Leader:        If only we could give ourselves
                   to the blows of the carver’s hands,

All:              Our faces would fall away
                   until we, growing younger toward death every day
                   would gather all our flaws in celebration.

 

SILENCE

PRAYERS

COMMON CONFESSION

Leader:         Despair rises up from the depths and we are blind to your presence.

People:         Holy Spirit, we need you to rekindle the light of hope.

Leader:         We are bowed down with remorse.

People:         Jesus, our Savior, we ask you to heal us with your tender touch.

     

Leader:         Too long have we lived with guilt, our shame blinding us to your love.

All:               Merciful One, lift us up from the mire and bestow your forgiveness upon us.

 

 

INDIVIDUAL PRAYERS OF CONFESSION

ASSURANCE

Leader:    God says to us:

                I desired you before the world began.

                I desire you now as you desire me.

                Where our desires are joined

                There love is, I in you and you in me.

 

All:             Amen.

 

PRAYERS OF THANKSGIVING AND INTERCESSION

JESUS PRAYER

All:                               Eternal One, Father and Mother of us all,

                                    Holy is your name.

                                    Let justice and mercy fill all Creation

                                    and let us recognize

                                    that every thought and thing belongs to you.

                                    Feed us with the bread we need for today.

                                    Forgive our sins

                                    as we forgive those who sin against us.

                                    Stand with us in trial and temptation.

                                    Free us from the grip of all that is evil.

                                    For you invite us into creation with you,

                                    now and forever.  Amen.

 

HYMN

 

THE WORD

SCRIPTURE

SERMON

SILENT REFLECTION

OFFERING

SHARED REFLECTIONS

ANNOUNCEMENTS

HYMN

BENEDICTION

Leader:            As we go out to love and serve the world,

                       May the One Who is Three guide us and bless us.

                       May we become the face of the Holy One

                       to all who meet us,

                       and see the face of the Holy Three

                       in all that surrounds us.

                       May the peace of Christ and the love of God

                       and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with us

                       and among us and within us, always.  Amen.

 

 

WORSHIP RESOURCES

Responsive Reading based on "The Faces of Braga" by David Whyte in Where Many Rivers Meet, pp 25-27.

Confession based on Psalm 120  from Psalms for Praying by Nan C. Merrill p. 268

Assurance based on the poem "God Speaks to the Soul" by Mechtild of Magdeburg
translated by Oliver Davies and found in Women in Praise of the Sacred

edited by Jane Hirshfield p.88

Jesus Prayer adapted by Seekers Church from New Zealand Book of Common Prayer

 

Feel free to copy from these liturgies. We only ask that when substantial portions are abstracted or used in a written work, Seekers Church be credited, and that the URL be cited.