Sunday Prayers 21/8

Prayers of Adoration & Confession

Watch or 7:01

In our gospel reading today Jesus sees a woman in a synagogue who is oppressed by an ailment which causes her to be bent over and ostracised by her society and her religious community. Jesus sets her free, and in her liberation, she stands up straight to praise God.  This is how Jewish people have always prayed, standing before God. During our prayer of adoration today I invite you to echo the woman’s liberation, beginning seated and then standing to say together parts of the Jewish Amidah, the central prayer of daily worship, known as the “standing prayer”.

Let us pray.
O God, we are here to praise your liberating power known among us through Jesus Christ. When you heal & act, we are in awe. We can only respond by standing and praising, feeling the power in all parts of our lives: body, soul and mind.  We praise you as we carry on the work that Jesus calls and empowers us to do in liberating all.

https://www.workingpreacher.org/dear-working-preacher/daughters-of-abraham

Please stand to pray as our Jewish siblings have always done, as Jesus did.
I invite you to join in the responses on the screen.

You are forever mighty, eternal one.
You are the source of eternal life.
You give life to all; great is your power to redeem.
You cause the wind to blow, the rain to fall, the sun to shine, and the dew to descend.
You sustain life through love; in your compassion, you grant us eternal life.
You give life to all, supporting the fallen, healing the sick, freeing the captive,
keeping faith with those who sleep in the dust.
Who is like you source of mighty acts?
Who resembles you Sovereign Author of life and death, causing deliverance to spring up?
Trusting you, we see life beyond death we trust in you who gives life to all.
Blessed are you Eternal One source of eternal life, who gives life to all.
Amen.

Let us pray our prayer of confession.
This time as we pray I invite you to open your hands in a gesture of open hearted humility before God.

We confess, O God, we can become tied up in small things, the rules and procedures, focusing on the outcomes, even in the way we sometimes view and action your Word. These ways can be in our minds and personalities, families, work, and our Church community. We pray for forgiveness when people are in pain, weighed down and we could offer, through you, liberation, but we remain bound up and rigid & cannot see a new perspective. Forgive us for when we are frustrated when ‘our’ plans are interrupted when someone is calling for liberation.

https://www.aplainaccount.org/post/luke-13-10-17-2

Lift our shutters, our blind spots, set us free when we forget, it is Christ through us, who gives liberty and is due praise. When we are more loyal to the narrow interpretation than to your work.

https://ourrabbijesus.com/articles/logic_healing_sabbath/

Forgive us when we fail to live out the words of Gangulu woman, Dr Lilla Watson:
‘If you have come to help me you are wasting your time.
If you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together’
We pray for discernment & wisdom, O God, to see when we are able to act for someone’s liberation and yet still walk within your holy Word and in Love. Amen.

Word of Grace
Gracious God, forgive us for these failures.
By your liberating Spirit transform our minds and hearts
so that we may do your will in love and praise.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord we are forgiven.
Thanks be to God.
Amen

Jenne Perlstein, offered for worship 21/08/2022, Pentecost 11