Prayers of Confession on Community
Gracious and loving God, you invite us to the table, yet we resist your grace. It is sometimes easier to float around outside of the Christian community than it is to invest fully in it. You invite others to the table as well—sometimes people whom we do not see as worthy, and sometimes people who make us feel unworthy ourselves. We put up barriers in places where you long to create circles of love and faith. We repent from these sins, and ask you to forgive us for these and all of our trespasses. We continue now to confess in silence…
Silent Prayer.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Submitted by Chip Hardwick
Heavenly Father, Although we surrender our lives to you individually, we are called to live and serve in community as one body. Nevertheless, we do not see each other equally or accurately. We tend to think that some are more gifted, more attractive, even more godly than others. Rather than claim Christ’s righteousness for all who believe, we judge one another, even ourselves, on worldly merit. Forgive us, Lord. Redeem us from our wrong thinking. Open our eyes to the truth of your perfect plan for Your church body to work graciously as one. We pray this humbly in Christ’s name. Amen.
Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church
Gracious God, again we thank you for creating us in your image. Today, we are reminded that your image is not captured fully in the solitary individual but also and necessarily in human community. In some astounding way, our relationships with others reflect who you are as God.
As we seek to live faithfully as human beings created in your image, may we see you in the interplay of our relationships. May your reality shape our community, so that we might be more like you each day. Amen.
Free us, Lord, from our obsession with ourselves
long enough to care for others; to be so concerned
about the well-being of the human community
that me don’t have to worry about our place, our
church, our class, our values, our vested interests.
Help us to know the joy and freedom of putting all
Our trust in you. Amen.
Walter Brueggemann, A Way Other Than Our Own: Devotions for Lent, Westminster John Knox Press, 2017, p.7.
Holy God, We are not meant to live life alone. We need You and the community of the church. Forgive us when we try to go it alone, When we think we can handle it all without any help. When we forget to rely on one another and on You. We need you and our brothers and sisters in Christ to live a faithful life. Help us to reach out to each other and to You remembering that a strand of three cords is not easily broken. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.
Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church
Gracious God, you call us to a life of intimate relationship with you and with one another. You call us to a life of community, where we actively seek the needs of others before our own. We acknowledge the ways we’ve fallen short of this standard. We repent of our selfishness. We repent of our apathy toward the needs of other. We repent of our laziness. We repent of the times when we neglect worshipping you. We repent of the times when we’ve failed to engage in your covenant community. Renew our desire for your church as we silently confess our sins before you now…
Submitted by Austin D. Hill
Heavenly Father, Although we surrender our lives to you individually, we are called to live and serve in community as one body. Nevertheless, we do not see each other equally or accurately. We tend to think that some are more gifted, more attractive, even more godly than others. Rather than claim Christ’s righteousness for all who believe, we judge one another, even ourselves, on worldly merit. Forgive us, Lord. Redeem us from our wrong thinking. Open our eyes to the truth of your perfect plan for your church body to work graciously as one. We pray this humbly in Christ’s name. Amen.
Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church
Holy and merciful God, we confess to you and to one another, and in the company of the communion of saints, that we have sinned by our own fault, in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have not done. We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength; nor have we loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others as we have been forgiven. Have mercy on us, O God, and restore us to a life of obedience. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Adapted from the Book of Common Prayer by Bud Thoreen
Looking for More Liturgical Elements?
Check out our Calls to Worship on Community.