Prayer - O God, Our Father, We Your Children Come to You

O God, our Father, we Your children come to You for a blessing. As the earth needs the sun and the rain from Heaven -- so do our lives need Your grace and love and life. We cannot live without You. Without blessings from You -- our souls would die. Pour upon us Your grace and love, as we bow at Your feet.

We have our duties for the day; we need wisdom that we may do them well. May You bestow upon us the grace that will prepare us for whatever You have in Your plan for us. We beseech You to help us to live together as a family, in a way that will honor You. Deepen our love for each other, and help us to be patient and kindly in all of our associations. Help us to make our love like Yours. Put Your love into our hearts -- and then we shall love truly. Destroy all selfishness in us, and give us the mind that was in Christ Jesus. Help us to bear one another's burdens, and to be patient one with another. Make our home more and more like Heaven. May we do Your will here -- as it is done in Heaven. May our love be like Heaven's love in . . .

its purity,

its tenderness,

its sincerity,

and its fellowship.

Give us grace to be helpers of each other's spiritual good -- to make each other holier, to provoke each other to love and good works. May we be means of grace to each other. We desire this morning to open our hearts to the Holy Spirit, that we may receive a new baptism of love as we go out for the day. Keep us from falling along the difficult way. Let no hurt come to us. Shield us from temptation -- or strengthen us to resist temptation. Bring us all home at nightfall, when the day is done. We ask all this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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THURSDAY EVENING

Lord, at this evening hour we come to You. It is a solemn hour. The day is done. We cannot get it back to undo anything in it which ought not to have been done -- or to do anything we ought to have done and did not do. All must stand until the judgment hour. It is solemn, too, because we are passing into the night, when no man can work. We ask for Your special peace. We beseech You to forgive all that has been wrong in our day. Then we commit ourselves into Your care for the night. Guard us and bless us tonight.

Our thoughts go out toward others at this quiet evening hour. Some are sick and some are sad, and some have never loved You, and some have lost the love they had. Some have found that this world is vain -- yet from the world they will not break free. We pray for these, that they may turn their hearts to You, and throw off the world's chains. Some have friends who give them pain, yet have not sought a friend in You. Have mercy upon these, and may they find in You the Friend who sticks closer than a brother.

We turn to You, O Savior, Jesus, in our pain and our solicitude, because of all these human needs. You, too, are man -- You have been troubled, tempted, tried, and You understand all these woes and sorrows. Your kind but searching glance, can scan the very wounds that shame would hide. Have pity, O Jesus, and in Your love send blessing. Your touch has still its ancient power; lay it on the spiritually sick and the diseased who lie around Your feet. No word from You can fall fruitless; speak the healing words, and let their power be felt. Hear our prayer in this solemn evening hour, and in Your mercy heal us all. We ask all in Your precious name. Amen.