Tag Archives: watch

Prayers based on Mark 13.24-37

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week 12Prayers Based on Mark 13:24-37
The Necessity of Watchfulness

Prayer: Morning by Morning
Morning by morning you waken me
You open my eyes to your presence and desire for this day
You know my weakness, my weariness
You open me to your sustaining

Morning by morning you waken me
Now open my mouth to share what first found me
In every season and circumstance
With every soul along the way

Morning by morning you waken me
My eyes, my ears
My mouth, my heart

Morning by morning you waken me
To You and to all
Find me faithful on your return

Prayer: Break Through
Break through Jesus
Break through the clouds with great power and glory
Break through the earth like tender fig leaves in summer

Break through our overcast eyes
our gravelly heart

Awaken us from apathy and busyness and self-deception
We’re asleep at the wheel of life
On automatic pilot faith

Nothing can keep you in the grave
Nothing can keep you from coming again
Awaken us
Raise us up
Make us alive with expectation and action
For our good and your glory. Amen

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For the next few months, I’ll be posting prayers to accompany Bishop Ken Carter’s Bible Study on Facebook. Each week, Bishop Carter will bring in a guest to speak about the passage. We’ll be walking through the last chapters of the Gospel of Matthew. 

You’re most welcome to read along and to join this Facebook discussion group. You don’t need to be a Methodist or attend a Methodist church. All are welcome and all means all.

May the grace of God’s word, the challenge, and the call, inspire us to great faith and great good works in Jesus’ name. – Lisa <

Morning by Morning © 2020 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia
Break Through © 2020 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia
You are welcome to use this work in a worship setting with proper attribution.
Please leave a comment for information and permission to publish this work in any form.

Midweek Devotion- Psalm 127

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Scripture: Psalm 127:1-2, NRSV

You’re encouraged to use the following process as you read scripture.
We use this process together on Wednesdays at 8:00AM EST. https://www.facebook.com/TrinityUMCSarasota 

Scripture: Psalm 127:1-2, NRSV

Breath Prayers Based on the Hymn, My Hope is Built
IN: My hope is built on nothing less
OUT: than Jesus’ blood and righteousness

IN: On Christ the solid rock we stand
OUT:

IN: My anchor holds within the gale
OUT:

STILLNESS: Spend 5-20 minutes in silence looking to God and listening for God.

ATTENTION: Read or listen to the Scripture. What word, phrase, or verse captures your attention? Underline it or copy it onto a piece of paper.

CONNECTION: What connections do you see to other scriptures? To your own experience or current situation? Or, to the character or promises of God?

ACTION: What is God inviting you to trust, say, or do? How will your life be different because of this scripture?

PRAY: Talk to God about what you just experienced or anything else on your heart.

Rev. Lisa Degrenia
Trinity Sarasota
http://www.itrinity.org
941-924-7756
trinity@iTrinity.org

Recorded 7/15/2020

Bind Us Together
CCLI Song # 1228
Bob Gillman © 1977
Thankyou Music (Admin. by Capitol CMG Publishing)
CCLI License # 686715

PUBLIC DOMAIN SONG:
My Hope is Built
Text by Edward Mote
Music by William B. Bradbury
_______________________________________
Midweek Devotion- Psalm 127 © 2020 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia

Prayer- Come, O Come Emmanuel

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Harpers_Magazine,_Christmas_1898-cropped

Harper’s Magazine, Christmas 1898 by Harvey Ellis. Via Wikimedia Commons.

First Verse of O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
O come, O come, Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here until the Son of God appear
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

Matthew 1:20-23
An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet Isaiah: “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.”

Come, O Come Emmanuel
Root of Jesse
Light of the World
Grace on grace on grace

Come, O Come Emmanuel
You who are flesh
Vulnerable and Lowly and Small

Come, O Come Emmanuel
You who are Great
Holy and Powerful and Forever

Come, O Come Emmanuel
The Fullness of God with us
Make your home in our heart
Replace the stone with your throne

Come, O Come Emmanuel
Save us
Ransom us
Heal us and Raise us

Come, O Come Emmanuel

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O Come, O Come Emmanuel © 2019 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia
You are welcome to use this work in a worship setting with proper attribution.
by Lisa Degrenia (www.revlisad.com)
Please leave a comment for information and permission to publish this work in any form.

Prayer- Show Me My Soul (Matthew 6.1-6)

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roots secret rest soul

Based on Matthew 6:1-6

Lord, show me my soul.

Am I truly seeking you and your ways?
Am I watching for you
or watching who is watching me?
Am I awake
Alert for the chance to bless
or looking for a way to be recognized?
Do I hunger and thirst for you
or applause?

Take me to the secret place,
the place only you can see
See my soul
See me
Show me my me
Show me my true motivation
Now show me true life

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Show Me My Soul © 2017 Lisa Ann Moss Degrenia
You are welcome to use this work in a worship setting with proper attribution.
Leave a comment for information and permission to publish this work in any form.

Two Reflections on Jesus Praying in Gethsemane

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christ-in-gethsemane-pExtended quote from Max Lucado, The Upper Room Disciplines 2010
It is a stark scene. Jesus praying in Gethsemane, saying, “My heart is ready to break with grief. …” Does this look like the picture of a saintly Jesus resting in the palm of God? Hardly. We see an agonizing, straining, and struggling Jesus. We see a “man of sorrows.” We see a man struggling with fear, wrestling with commitments, and yearning for relief.

We see Jesus in the fog of a broken heart.

My, what a portrait! Jesus is in pain. Jesus is on the stage of fear. Jesus is cloaked, not in sainthood, but in humanity.

The next time the fog finds you, remember Jesus in the garden. The next time you think no one understands, reread the fourteenth chapter of Mark. The next time your self-pity convinces you that no one cares, pay a visit to Gethsemane. And the next time you wonder if God really perceives the pain that prevails on this dusty planet, listen to the pleading among the twisted trees.

Seeing God like this does wonders for our own suffering. God was never more human than at this hour. God was never nearer to us than when God hurt. The Incarnation was never so fulfilled as in the garden.

Jesus, may I watch with you in your pain and so come to understand that you watch me in mine. Amen.

Matthew 26:40-41
Could you not stay awake with me one hour? Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.

We must have faith during the period of our grief. We think that our afflictions will be greater than we can bear, but we do not know the strength of our own hearts, nor the power of God. – François Fenelon

Stay Awake by Steve Garnaas Holmes
I slip into sleep,
a deadness I seek,
a trance of avoidance,
distraction’s pleasant coma.
I am numb to your world, O Christ,
to your suffering, your love,
unconscious of you here.

Awaken me.
Breathe yourself into me
and rouse me
from my fearful distance.

Let even pain keep me awake,
attentive to your pain
in all who hurt,
your love keep me alert
to love in all your forms.

Grant me this simple gift,
all you ask:
that I may stay awake,
trusting I am not orphaned,
and pray with you,
so earnestly praying for me
and all the world.
just stay awake my little time
and pray with you.

Let all my waking hours
be wakeful hours.