Having confessed, been assured of our forgiveness, and brought before God the concerns we hold for others, we prepare to go out into Lent on a voyage seeking the path to Jerusalem. In a moment, there will be one final prayer and then some music to conclude our service. You may wish to spend some […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 08 – Concerns for others
While we enter Lent in confessing our own faults, and those of the church, it is right too that we should bring to mind those who need our prayers at this time. Prayer: The World at root is good O God, as we look at your world we can come close to despair. When we […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 07 – Forgiveness told
There are several stories of forgiveness which we find in the Christian Bible. Jesus was good at standing out to question injustice and inequality and to preach forgiveness and love. We will hear a story from John’s gospel, after which we will have a short period of silence to reflect on how God’s forgiveness has […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 06 – Confessions Forgiven
God’s forgiveness is offered to all who ask for it – not once but many, many times. We have come before God to ask for forgiveness of our sins, for God to tear up our blotted record, for God to give us a clean heart and an open mind. Create in me a clean heart, […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 05 – Introducing Confession
We are sharing this time together in remembering our wrongdoings, of bringing our broken, sinful selves before God in penitence and in faith. In silence and in action we will speak from our heart of the thing or things we wish to let God know of and to ask for God’s forgiveness. We will start […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 04 – A prayer – Lent Returns
It’s that time of year: pancakes all tossed, on with the forty days and nights. Our annual repentance is now under way, of heat and dust. Whilst you survived the heat and dust of the desert helped by angels and wildlife, we, for whom pancakes come easier than repentance, do not look forward to returning […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 03 – A reading from Joel
Joel 2.12-13: Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing. Move onto […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 02 – Opening words
Today is Ash Wednesday. As we move into the penitential time of Lent, it is right that part of the journey we take is one of seeking forgiveness from God, for reflecting on the ways in which we may not always live our lives in the way God would like us to live, and for […]
Ash Wednesday 2016 – 01 – Opening Prayer
God of this Lenten season, you prepare our hearts for the coming sacrifice. You are the one who changed the world with your costly gift on the cruel cross: God, whom we adore, we come before you to be changed. You healed our darkness with the flood of Easter light; Blossoming out of the barren […]