Opening Prayer: Philippians 2: 6-11

Here is a wonderful opening prayer written by Bruce Prewer, and posted on his website

Prayer of Approach

Most wonderful God,
the beauty we see in Jesus
is your beauty veiled in human flesh,
the love we witness from Bethlehem to Golgotha
is your love contracted to a span.
If Christ’s life is so holy as to fill us with wonder,
how much more would your unveiled beauty
leave us overwhelmed and trembling?
You are more than the eye could bear,
more than the mind can ever fathom.

Yet you have so carefully made us
that although we cannot fathom you,
we can yet love you.
Gratefully we bring our little lives to you,
asking that our worship may arise from love and be shaped by love,
and be directed towards that larger loving which is our soul’s desire.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen!

— Bruce Prewer, posted on Bruce Prewer’s Homepage

For other prayers and prayer resources on this blog, see this Prayer index.


For more worship resources related to this text, or other texts for September 25, 2011 (the fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost), click on Proper 21A in the list of “Labels” at the lower right side of the page.