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The Timeless Psalmsby Joan Stott |
A Call to Worship
Psalm 116: 1-2, 12-19, Maundy Thursday Year B 2012
Listening God, we praise you for teaching us aboutyour listening ear, and how to love and serve you.
We gather this day in response to the way you hear
our prayers, and we offer our sacrifice of thanksgiving.
Holy God, we praise you for teaching us about worship
and reverence of you, and how to love and serve you.
We gather this day in response to your warm welcome
to everyone, and we offer our sacrifice of joyous praise.
Love-engendering God, we praise you for teaching us
about love and loving, and how to love and serve you.
We gather this day in response to your tender care,
your attentive listening, and for your generous actions—
and we offer to you our sacrifice of renewed commitment. Amen.
If used in shared worship, please provide an acknowledgement as follows:
© 2012 Joan Stott – "The Timeless Psalms" RCL Psalm Year B, used with permission.
Prayers of Thankfulness
Psalm 116: 1-2, 12-19, Maundy Thursday Year B 2012
Grace-giving, grace sharing God, we gather today topraise and thank you, to worship, honour and revere
you because you are the God who understand us; who
comes near to us in our needs, and who accepts us,
even when we have failed everyone that is dear to us.
Loving God, we want to respond to you in ways that
express our gratitude and thankfulness for the patient
and loving mercy of God, that we experience each day.
Yet, what can we really offer to God that is a fitting and
suitable sacrifice of praise when we are here present with
so many people, when it is often our very personal needs
that have been met by God? All we can do in response, is
to rejoice in the fact that we are precious to God, and that
God has a lively and living involvement with us, and in what
we offer to God as a personal and joint sacrifice of praise.
Inspirational God, we give thanks that you do accept our
flawed and often inadequate worship and praise; and that
you encourage us in our growth in understanding of God
and God’s holy ways, so that we can indeed lift of the cup
of praise and thankfulness to the honour and glory of our God. Amen.
If used in shared worship, please provide an acknowledgement as follows:
© 2012 Joan Stott – "The Timeless Psalms" RCL Psalm Year B, used with permission.
A Personal Meditation
Psalm 116: 1-2, 12-19, Maundy Thursday Year B 2012
Listening God, I am so grateful that you are always near me,ready to receive my offerings of worship and praise. Like those
people who follow the ancient practice of literally raising their cup
as a symbol of thankfulness and praise, I, too, lift up my cup in
a toast to God’s saving mercy and grace. These ancient followers
of God raised their cup after reading special records from holy
scriptures about God’s creative powers, and they recalled God’s
saving actions of past generations. I raise my cup in thanksgiving
before God and before God’s people, for God’s gifts to me that
have given my life purpose, meaning, dignity and value in service.
| Creative pause: | I lift up my cup to God’s saving mercy and grace. |
Responding God, it has been suggested by learned scholars that
‘crying’ or ‘calling’ on the name of the Lord actually means yelling at
God. Somehow, to me that does not seem very reverent or worshipful
to yell at God, and yet I believe that people often yell at God in their
anguish and pain! Perhaps I have never walked in their shoes, or
suffered their deep torments, for which I am so grateful. I am reminded
by the Psalmist that God’s people are very precious to God, and that
their welfare is important to God. I hope and pray that as I worship
God in private and within a community, that I am able to honour and
serve God in ways that are appropriate and bring honour to God’s name.
| Creative pause: | Is yelling at God reverent or worshipful? |
Accepting God, I offer to you, privately and amongst my community
of colleagues and friends, a commitment to regularly raising the cup
in praise and thankfulness for all God’s loving mercy and grace, and
for giving me this life of worship, witness and service - with all its
human mistakes, weakness and fallibility - but with a heart and mind
that desires to love and serve my Lord for of all my remaining days.
| Creative pause: | A commitment to raise the cup in praise and thankfulness. |