(Download PDF For Today’s Daily Prayer Guide)

Setting aside even a brief time each day to pray helps us create a stable spiritual center in our lives. This guided prayer is largely based on the Morning, Noon and Evening Prayer cycle found in the Book of Common Prayer.

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Online Text Version

INSTRUCTIONS: The underlined text  are headings and do not need to be read. [Brackets] are instructions to be followed but not necessarily read. (Parentheses) are references and not to be read. FOR INDIVIDUAL PRAYER: I suggest you read the prayer sheet aloud, but reading silently is fine too. Don’t pay any attention to the Bold Italic Type. FOR GROUP PRAYER: have one person act as leader. The leader reads the regular print and everyone reads the Bold Italic Type together.

Daily Prayer for December 21

Opening Sentences:

Make our hearts leap with joy, and fill our mouths with songs of praise, that we may announce glad tidings of Peace, and welcome the Christ in our midst. ^ff

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; not like the covenant that I made with their ancestors, on the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt…  This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel…I will put my laws in their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people…they shall all know me from the least of them to the greatest…and I will remember their sins no more. (Hebrews 8:8-12)

Praying Together:

Lord, open our lips.

Our mouth shall proclaim your praise. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever.  Amen.

Confession:

Merciful God, you have given us all we need, and yet we always want more. 

We repent of our selfish and indulgent ways.  We repent that we put our own wants and needs above the needs and the safety for the greater good.  We repent that we care more about things than we do about people. 

And most of all dear Lord, because of all our selfish desires, we have not loved you with our whole heart, we have not done your will, we have not loved our neighbor, we have not taken care of the widow and the orphan. We have dishonored your Son whose birth we celebrate in just a few days.  Forgive us Lord, repair our hearts and turn us toward your loving and merciful ways.  Lord in your mercy hear our confession and forgive.  Amen.

When we confess our sins, God is faithful and just and forgives our sins, cleansing us from all unrighteousness.

From Psalm 96:

Honor and majesty are before him; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary. Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts.  Worship the Lord in holy splendor, tremble before him, all the earth. 

[Silent Prayer; or Music may be listened to; or a Hymn is sung.]

Prayers of the People:

Almighty God, we praise you, we love you, and we thank you this day for all of the blessings you bestow on your people. 

Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer.

 [Silent Prayer]

We pray comfort for all of the families who have lost loved ones during this pandemic, that they may know your loving and merciful presence. 

Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer. 

[Silent Prayer]

We pray for those who are homeless, and for whom the threat of homelessness looms large in the coming weeks, send your angels to guide and protect them. 

Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer. 

[Silent Prayer]

We pray for the leaders of our nation, Lord, that they act in accordance with their vows to represent all of the people of this great nation. 

Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer. 

[Silent Prayer]

Everlasting God, hear our prayer as we pray together:

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

Closing prayer:

May the Lord bless you and keep you, may the Lord make his face to shine upon you and give you peace.  Now go in peace to love and to serve the Lord.  Amen.

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Sources:

^ff From Revised Common Lectionary Prayers, Consultation on Common Texts

Image: Visitation of Mary by Jacopo da Pontormo, 1494-1556., from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=49490

*Job and Shawchuck, A Guide to Prayer for All God’s People, p. 43

Music Selection from The Hymnal Project

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