Lent 5 – Listening from the earth

Prayers of Adoration

Divine who walked amongst us, spirit who travels through us,
parent who knows and cherishes us, help us to know you in our sadness and our joy.
As we listen in our Lenten time of reflection,
may we feel the tender warmth of our grief
In the grey moments of everyday melancholy
In the dark hues of feeling small in the face of so much sorrow
Help us to know that these aches, these creaky feelings
of otherness and small despair are a part of you in us.
As we reflect in the waning sun of the journey of the carpenter to the cross,
help us to know your pain in ours.
That, just as your tender moments of despair were glorified, as are ours.
That in this trauma of endings there will be a morning,
a spark of light and a reason of celebration.
In the night, help us to honour the pain in our journeys
and in the hopeful glow if a new day let us be thankful.
Amen.

Prayers of Confession

In this season of humble reflection, we carry our crosses to you, creator of our minds.
We know our tender flaws, the small frustrations in the way we don’t listen,
the ways we draw down our shutters to new life and joys,
the negative narratives we weave in our minds that we are lesser, that they are lesser.
In the beauty of this pain let us forgive our destructive introspection.

In this time of being and listening, open up our senses to the calm chaos of our lives.
As we listen in the pain of other’s suffering,
feel weariness of the world around us, allow us to sit in this sorrow.
Help us not to turn away, but to gently know your pain and mourning
reflected in our world, and sit and witness this
as an expression of the kingdom of your people.

In this moment, help us to honour our thoughts and feelings as a part of your creation.
Help us to know these ponderings in all of your beings,
in the quiet tired patter of a wombat finding shelter,
of the loud crashes of a gum tree branch falling to the earth,
in the steady and silent melting of ancient landmasses,
help us to in the gentle pains of our planet.

As we listen and witness in all our sorrows,
let us be joyful in the knowledge that you Christ,
divine parent and Holy Spirit know us and hold us.
Receive the gift of this tender love of us, that in this our sins are forgiven.
Thanks be to God. Amen

Anika Jensen, offered for worship 18/3/18,  Lent 5

Prayers of the People

Gracious and glorious God, you hear our prayers before we speak,
and answer before we know our need.
Although we cannot pray as we ought, may your Spirit pray in us,
drawing us to you and towards our neighbours.

We dare to pray for peace in the world.
From your prophets we have been given a vision of a world
where weapons are disarmed, guns silenced,
and ancient and modern hatreds are defused.

And so we pray for peacemakers in South Sudan, Palestine, Syria
and all the places where violence and hatred does its destructive work.
Gracious and glorious God, bring peace on earth.

With a mixture of hope and frustration
we pray for those who govern us and other nations.
Turn their ambition towards justice and mercy.
Replace small-mindedness with generosity and kindness.
We especially for a softening of that hardness of heart
by which our leaders demonise, exclude and condemn.

And so we pray for politicians and policy-makers
in this nation, state and city, especially for those
who quietly work to heal our broken political culture.
Gracious and glorious God, bring love and compassion to politics.

We pray for the Christian community scattered around this world
and journeying once again through Lent,
preparing again to encounter the mystery and hope of Easter.
Keep us mindful of this wider Christian family in all its diversity and tensions.
We especially pray for small Christian communities
who lack material resources or social acceptance and who experience persecution.

And so we pray for the Coptic community in Egypt,
the Christians of India and Pakistan,
and other places where to be Christian is to be vulnerable.
Gracious and glorious God, bring trust, love and unity to your Church.

We pray for ourselves in all the joy and challenges of being this community of faith.
Increase our love for one another and keep us mindful
of the needs that exist amongst us and around us.
For those who are lonely or fearful, exhausted by life or ill –
may they know they are loved by you and this community.
For those whose struggles are silent and unknown,
may they always be welcomed and accepted here.

And so we pray for each other, for our ministers and leaders
and all who have contact with this church.
Gracious and glorious God may we always be
a community living and proclaiming the love of Jesus Christ.

All these prayers we pray in the name of Jesus Christ,
the one who is your love and in whose love we live. Amen.

Geoff Thompson, offered for worship 18/3/18, Lent 5