❖ Assurance of Pardon

Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?” I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

[Revelation 7:13–14]

❖ Confession of Sin

O Almighty and merciful Father, you pour your benefits upon us—forgive the unthankfulness with which we have requited your goodness. We have remained before you with dead and senseless hearts, unkindled with love of your gentle and enduring goodness. Turn us, O merciful Father, and so shall we be turned. Make us with our whole heart to hunger and thirst after you, and with all our longing to desire you. Amen.

[Anselm]

❖ Reading of the Law

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

[1 John 4:7–11]

❖ Adoration

O Lord, God Almighty, you are the creator and governor of the world, and have abundantly provided for the various wants of your creatures; you have ordered the day and the night to succeed each other, and when you have refreshed man with sleep, require him to pursue his work until the evening; you have also ordained that he shall be born to trouble, and have appointed the grave to be the end of all living—we thank you, that, while you have thus placed our lot in this life, you have not left us without hope in that world which is to come. We adore you for the gift of Jesus Christ your Son, by whose gospel, life and immortality are brought to light, and we are fully instructed in all those things which concern our salvation. We bless you for the pardon of sin, through faith in a redeemer; for the guidance of your providence; and for the consolations of your Spirit. We thank you for your holy Sabbaths; for your written Word; and for all the other means of grace, which you have entrusted to us. Amen.

[Henry Thornton]

❖ Call to Worship

How lovely is your dwelling place,

O Lord of hosts!

My soul longs, yes, faints

for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and flesh sing for joy

to the living God.

[Psalm 84:1–2]

❖ Lord’s Prayer

Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name;

your kingdom come;

your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.

For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever.

Amen.

❖ Prayer of Intercession

God, the protector of all those who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy—increase and multiply on us your mercy; that you being our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we finally lose not the things eternal. Grant this, heavenly Father, for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[Book of Common Prayer]

❖ Scripture Reading

• Exodus 4

• Luke 7

• Job 21

• 1 Corinthians 8

❖ Prayer for Illumination

Grant, Almighty God, that as you shine on us by your Word, we may not be blind at midday, nor willfully seek darkness, and thus lull our minds asleep; but may we be roused daily by your words, and may we stir up ourselves more and more to fear your name and thus present ourselves and all our pursuits as a sacrifice to you, that you may peaceably rule, and perpetually dwell in us, until you gather us to your celestial habitation, where there is reserved for us eternal rest and glory, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[John Calvin]

❖ Catechism

Westminster Shorter Catechism

Question 20

❖ Praise

Glory be to the Father

and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit:

As it was in the beginning,

is now and ever shall be,

world without end. Amen.

[Gloria Patri]

❖ Nicene Creed

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty,

Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God;

begotten of the Father before all worlds;

God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God;

begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father;

by whom all things were made.

Who, for us men and for our salvation,

came down from heaven

and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary,

and was made man;

and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate;

he suffered and was buried;

and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures;

and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father;

and he shall come again, with glory, to judge the living and the dead;

whose kingdom shall have no end.

And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life;

who proceeds from the Father and the Son;

who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified;

who spoke by the prophets.

And I believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church.

I acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins;

and I look for the resurrection of the dead,

and the life of the world to come.

Amen.

❖ Assurance of Pardon

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

[Ezekiel 36:25–27]

❖ Confession of Sin

O Lord, let not your law be a cursing to our consciences, but rather give us grace under this extreme and heavy burden of sin, to be fully persuaded, that you by your death have taken away all our sins, and fulfilled the law for us, and by this means have delivered us from the curse of the law and paid our ransom; and then we, being thus fully persuaded, may have quiet and settled hearts, and a free conscience, and glad desiring wills to forsake this wicked world. Amen.

[Henry Smith]

❖ Reading of the Law

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

You shall have no other gods before me.

You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

You shall not murder.

You shall not commit adultery.

You shall not steal.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.

[Exodus 20:1–17]

❖ Lord’s Prayer

Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name;

your kingdom come;

your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.

For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever.

Amen.

❖ Prayer of Intercession

I ask you, my most gracious God,

preserve me from the cares of this life,

lest I should be too much entangled in them;

and from the many necessities of the body,

lest I should be ensnared by pleasure;

and from whatsoever is an obstacle to the soul,

lest, broken with troubles, I should be overthrown.

Amen.

[Thomas à Kempis]

❖ Scripture Reading

• Exodus 3

• Luke 6

• Job 20

• 1 Corinthians 7