Week Five: The fifth petition
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.
Opening Litany
On this day, we step boldly, humbly into the presence of our God, praying with our suffering Savior the prayer he taught us to pray:
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.
Sustaining God, we know that peace lies in the heart of darkness—in the wilderness of the soul.
Something prompts us to keep still, to trust and to listen to your voice.
—adapted from a prayer by Thomas Merton in New Seeds of
Contemplation (New York: New Directions, 1972), p. 237
Lead us not into temptation.
Deliver us from evil.
Lord, lead us not into the temptation of self-righteousness. Keep us from false use of our tongues, or inappropriate silence. Do not let us fall into the temptation of self-righteousness or believing that we are free from sin.
Save us Lord, from earth-destruction—this can’t be your will; save us from all that is evil, without and within. Grant commitment to that which is wholesome, and help us to be good to our neighbor, as we would have you do to us.
Silence: A time of reflection
Song: “My Faith Looks up to Thee” PsH 262, PH 383, RL 446, TH528, TWC 552 (st. 1, 3)
Passing of God’s Peace
Prayer of Confession
We bring to you, O Lord, the wastelands of our lives, when faith and hope are dust and ashes, when the fruit of the Spirit is not in evidence, when love does not find expression in us.
—adapted from Worshiping Ecumenically (Geneva: WCC Publications, 1995), pp. 32-33
Help us to follow you into the desert to fast, denying false luxury values, refusing the tempting ways of self-indulgence, the way of success at all costs. Jesus, our Brother, help us to follow you.
Help us to follow you to town and city, to heal and restore, to cast out self-destructive fears.
Jesus, our Savior, help us to follow you.
—adapted from a prayer by Christopher Duraisingh (India) in Bread of Tomorrow, pp. 64-65
You give us shelter in the wilderness and make for us a home in the wastelands.
From you comes the courage to discover that the risen Christ will lead us from temptation and deliver us from evil.
You offer daily bread, Lord, in this desert, in this wasteland of temptation; you extend living water.
Holy is your name!
Temptation flees from your light, O Lord, and evil cowers in the shadows.
Silence
Song: “Go to Dark Gethsemane” PsH 381, PH 97, TWC 225 (st. 1)
Silence: The people are invited to pray in silence
Song: “Nothing Can Trouble”
The Word Proclaimed
Scripture: Matthew 6:5-13; James 1:12-18
Sermon Notes: “Lead Us Not into Temptation”
The Heidelberg Catechism teaches that we have three sworn enemies: the devil, the world, and our own flesh. Jesus teaches us to pray this petition because he knows the softness of our own convictions and the hard reality of deep temptation. He knows our tendency to take the road most traveled—the path of least resistance.
The Bible takes the devil seriously. It says we have an adversary, a destroyer, the deceiver of the whole world who misrepresents God and creates
confusion. He is sometimes called the accuser, for he despises God’s love for us; sometimes Diabolos, which means the splitting one—for he seeks to divide us from God and against each other and even against ourselves, causing us to dis-integrate. He prowls around this world like a lion looking for whom he might destroy like Tolkein’s Dark Lord.
But we should not restrict our understanding of the evil one to just a personal threat. Consider also what Paul calls the “powers and principalities”—those organized, pervasive cultural forces that rage against the kingdom of God. These include the
ideologies of “the economy,” “nation,” and “race.”
The world tells us that when it comes to the powers, our task is to adjust, to adapt. Jesus tells us to pray: protect us from the seductive powers of our age, the cultural powers and forces that rationalize and perpetuate evil.
We Go Forth
We thank you, sustaining God, for deserts, places in which we wait—places of self-discovery.
Lead us not into temptation, Lord, but deliver us from the evil one. Amen!
Song: “The Song of St. Patrick” (Gather Comprehensive , 703)
Week Six: The sixth petition
For yours is the kingdom
and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
Opening Litany
We gather on this day to celebrate God’s everlasting power: our Maker, ever creating. Christ on a donkey, our King. Holy Spirit, brooding over the world.
Holy, Holy, Holy, One God Almighty, your glory fills all the heavens and the earth!
Song: “O Lord, Hear My Prayer” SNC 203 (st. 2)
Silence
We wrestle God in prayer, as Christ taught:
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.
Silence: A time of reflection
Song: “Majesty”
Passing of God’s Peace
Prayer of Confession
Like Jerusalem, O Christ, our sin must cause you to weep: For we confess, the things that make for peace are hidden from our eyes.
We seek your mercy.
Your house of prayer for all the nations, we have made a den of robbers.
God, forgive us.
With the crowds, we shout hosanna, little knowing who you really are.
Christ, show us grace.
Do not be afraid, daughter of Zion. Look, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt! (John 12:17)
Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! (John 12:13)
This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.
Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!
Hear the promise of this servant king: “Truly I tell you, if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and if you do not doubt in your heart, but believe that what you say will come to pass, it will be done for you. So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” (Mark 11:23-24)
Song: “Meekness and Majesty” SNC 109
Silence
Song: “Nothing Can Trouble”
Prayer: The people are invited to pray their petitions in silence
Proclamation of the Word
Scripture: Matthew 21:1-11
Sermon Notes: “Yours Is the Kingdom . . .”
Words like kingdom, power, and glory are risky words. The world loves them. Kings and presidents build kingdoms and defend them with murderous intensity. Power is often used for self-interest and the control of others. And glory is what comes to those who wield more power than others.
The meaning of these three words is captured and summarized in the life of Jesus. Ideas of power and glory that are divorced from his life and ministry are either false or incomplete. He wields neither the power of the sword nor of the popular vote, but the power of obedience to the law of unfailing love, the power of forgiven sin, the power of relinquishment. The power of embrace. The subversive power of powerlessness.
His glory is not that of raised flags and marching bands but of scars that speak of sacrificial love. His glory is, of all things, a cross. He is nothing like what the people expected then or even today. He is a
contrary king, a contrary power, a contrary glory.
And he bids us follow him. What might the world be like if we did? What might I be like?
We Go Forth
Go into the world knowing that the kingdom, the power, and the glory are God’s.
The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
Song: “Now to the One” or “To God Be the Glory” PsH 632