Tag Archive: Origin Church

Prayer of the People, 11 Dec 2020

December 14, 2020 0 Comments

Heavenly Father, 

It’s December in Vancouver. As the darkness of longer nights envelops us we keep the lights on longer. Fortunately the light of your love never goes out, but we would have been blind to it, except for the grace of faith in Jesus — the Light of the World. By this grace you have included us in your communion — the communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Thank you!

For each one of us there have been messengers of your grace who provided us with clues to your goodness and who have announced your good news. Thank you for these friends of yours who have treated us according to your own faithful love.

We were soul sick with an incurable disease. But you have provided the balm that heals us. 
We were soul weary weighed down by idols received with false promises. But you have provided our deliverance.
We were sucked of all joy but you have set before us the joyful reality of your Kingdom and your Holy Spirit keeps pouring your love into our lives.

Praise be to you, the lover and shepherd of our souls!

We lift up to you the many who accompany us through life in this city but do not know your Son. Oh Lord that you would be born in them and bring them to faith in You which is  eternal life.

We lift up to you the Shamattawa First Nation in northern Manitoba as they deal with an outbreak of Covid 19. Please bring healing. Please grant them peace over the anxiety that accompanies this menace. Please let them feel loved not forgotten, cared for not abandoned.

We lift up to you our brothers and sisters working in this City and across the globe. May their worship of you be accompanied by complete surrender to you. Grant them wisdom to serve people and steward your gifts through their work. May your goodness saturate their workplaces and amplify your abundant blessings for all.

Oh Lord Come. Come Lord Jesus Come. 

(Please join me in the Lord’s Prayer.)
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.
And 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.
Amen.

This prayer was part of the Origin Church Weekend Broadcast on 11 Dec 2020.

Prayer

, ,

Prayer of the People, 14 August 2020

August 17, 2020 0 Comments

Heavenly Father,

How shall we live in view of your mercy? You have saved us from the pit of despair and have clothed us in the righteousness of your Son Jesus. You have seated us at your table and filled our hearts with the songs of your Spirit. You have brought us into your communion — the communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Thank you! We shall praise you and bring to mind your mighty acts on behalf of people. May you be glorified in the hearts of people from all nations. May the blessings you have so richly given to your church be generously shared from every gathering of your disciples.

Today we lift up to you the people of Lebanon. They have suffered greatly from the explosion in the port of Beirut. Comfort those who have suffered the loss of loved ones in the blast. We ask you to fortify the people with hope and to raise up peacemakers among the leaders who are able to coordinate relief for people in the clean-up and the rebuilding. We thank you for the friendship Lebanon has shown to many people on the journey for refuge. In this nation with such a lengthy history we pray that the love of Jesus would rise up strong and full of life like the majestic cedars of old.

We lift up to you the people of Hong Kong and pray that you would comfort them. May your church continue to join itself to people who are suffering under hopelessness and despair even as they proclaim the good news of your Kingdom and the forgiveness of sin through faith in Jesus Christ. Fortify your servants with your love O Lord.

We lift up students seeking to discern their next steps and to make plans for this school year.. Lord we need your wisdom and your guidance. Train us in your way and grant us courage to persevere with you through the uncertainties and fears of the pandemic. You have told us “Be not afraid.” Help us to love our neighbour well and to make adjustments in our lives with a growing understanding of reality. Grant us the wisdom of to be merciful to the weak and to do good to all.

Oh, Lord we yearn for your Kingdom to be fully established in our hearts and on our city so we pray as Jesus teaches us:  (Please join me in the Lord’s Prayer.)

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.
And 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. 
Amen.

This prayer was part of the Origin Church Weekend Broadcast, Meeting God When We Are Busy, on 14 August 2020.

Prayer

, ,

Prayer of the People, 1 May 2020

May 5, 2020 0 Comments

Here’s the Prayer of the People from the Origin Weekend Broadcast for 1 May 2020.

Heavenly Father,

Thank you for bringing us into your communion — the communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This costly grace formed in the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus has granted us the faith in which we stand and has changed our lives forever. Thank you!

In Christ Jesus you have radically altered our past, present, and future.
You have forgiven us of our sins.
You have wiped the slate clean.
You have loved us.
You have brought us out of the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of Your Son.
You have given us a new heart.
You have filled us with your Spirit.

You are making us new.
You are renewing our minds.
You are transforming our attitudes and actions.
You are giving us new desires.
You are fulfilling your word.
You are pouring your love into our lives.

You will cause every promise in Christ to be a Yes.
You will return to set all things right.
You will redeem our lives.
You will be praised forever!

Oh Spirit, Come— Gather the Church of Jesus into praise and into intercession with you.

We long for every tear to be tenderly wiped from our faces.
We long for our faith to be sight. But even now Lord fortify us with the disciplines and rhythms that tap deeply into your life and your Word.

Oh Lord, we set before you peoples who feel forgotten and crushed in this coronavirus pandemic. We plead with you for healing across the whole planet. We seek You for peace in homes and the transformation of relationships fractured by neglect or even violence. We pray that the love of Jesus would abound so that our neighbours experience love and not accusation and hate because of race.

We seek You & your Kingdom so we pray as Jesus taught us: (Please join me in the Lord’s Prayer)

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.
And 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.  Amen

Church, Prayer

, ,

Prayer of the People — 24 April 2020

April 27, 2020 0 Comments

Heavenly Father,

Thank you for giving us the grace of faith. We know we do not live by sight but by faith. Yet, you have given us the eyes of faith to recognize you in the Gospel and in the world around us. Thank you for the delight of residing in your communion — the communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In seeing Jesus in the Gospel we are getting to look into what angles had longed to see. Oh Lord grant us the grace of living full into this mystery revealed! Christ in us — the hope of glory.

Too often Lord our days do not seem all that glorious. Help us love you with all our minds, all our hearts, and all our strength in the course of our daily rhythms: making meals, washing dishes, cleaning spaces, folding laundry, taking up our work, setting our work down, and loving the people closest to us.

Grant us the courage and wisdom required to be curious about people and inquisitive without judgment. May kindness flow from our faces, our speech, and our actions because you are close.

Oh Lord we grieve with the people of Nova Scotia who are reeling from the violence and hate that has visited them. Protect them Lord from the evil one. In the name of Jesus bind up their wounded hearts and cast out the seeds of suspicion and bitterness that have been sown. 

Lord we ask for grace to help those who are suffering through the coronavirus pandemic. Every loss requires its own grace. But Lord, so many around the world are in danger of disease and famine. We retreat from the castles of our greed and ask that you would show us how to love our neighbours well and to support those serving the least of these. But even here in our city and around our campuses people are being oppressed by loneliness and depression. Instruct us in the word that will lift them up.

We are among those who cry out — we would see Jesus.
Oh Lord, we would see Jesus lifted up in His church.

So we pray as He taught us (Please join me in the Lord’s Prayer)

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.
And 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. 
Amen.

The Prayer of the People for 24 April 2020 was used the in the Origin Church Weekend Broadcast. If you would like information or encouragement for hosting a House Church during the Coronavirus Pandemic please reach out to me.

You Must Be Born Again ~ Life Journey With Jesus – Origin Online – 24 April 2020

Prayer

,

Journey Through John, #4, John 1.11-13, Born by the Will of God

March 23, 2020 0 Comments

Dear Friends,

This past Sunday was the second Sunday since our congregation got swept up in the storm called Covid-19. For two weeks now we have not gathered and that’s how it will be for the foreseeable future. I hate it.

I think I’m supposed to be excited about seeing you all online and connecting with you from a distance. But I’m grieving the loss of seeing you, just running into you on campus, gathering with you, seeing you in the city– and now of not even saying proper goodbyes. This storm has swept us up and scattered us across the globe.

I’m realizing that I can’t do this Journey Through John as if I’m just expositing the Word of God in a timeless vacuum. So, I’m going to write to my Dear Friends. That’s what you are to me. Yes I know I have served as a pastor to you under the guidance of Jesus our Great Shepherd. But even there I have sought to treat you as friends. 

My salvation testimony has its “event” prompted by the Holy Spirit when my my Sunday School teacher, Molly McCracken read from John 15:12-17. Even at 9, and even still, I am astonished that Jesus would call me a friend. It’s what I wanted at 9 and it’s what I enjoy now. 

As friends transformed by Jesus, I wish I was better at friendship with you and with Him. But I hope that’s the yearning of the Spirit in me for the communion of God and with His saints. 

I am eternally grateful to Jesus for choosing me. I pray often that He would choose you and that you would receive Him fully. There is tension in life for the friends of Jesus.

I believe John the Apostle was deeply aware of these tensions: the desire to treat all as friends of Jesus being stretched by the desire of God to transform all people through friendship with Him, and the reality that some people even though they have been granted the grace of God’s dignity towards them will not change their minds about HIm. Thus John writes that although Jesus came to those He created (the world) and those He had formed as His own (Israel) they did not recognize Him or receive Him. Yet…

12Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

John 1:11-13, NIV

I’m so grateful for this super work of God. To be born of God, by His will and not my own. To be born as a friend of God when I’m not all that great at friendship — amazing! This friends is our lot in Christ: we have been born of Him through the Holy Spirit-activated-act of seeing Jesus for who He is, and receiving Him for who He is. This is the will of our Heavenly Father — that we would be born of His will, not just our families’ will, but of His will!

Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord Oh you friends of Jesus! Come all, come all and receive His friendship!

Let’s pray.

Heavenly Father,

Even in your family you would have us act as friends of Jesus. Even in this world you would have us treat all as if they could be a friend of Jesus — even our enemies. Thank you for the grace of recognizing and receiving Jesus. We have been born of your will, not our own, not of our families’ will, not of our parents’ will, nor of our nation’s will, but of your will. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you! May our spiritual birth into a life with you be full of awe and new mercies.

In Jesus Name,
Amen.


Our next reading will be: John 1:14-15

(Note to those receiving this as an email. Click through to my blog if you would like to view the reading as a video.)

Journey Through John's Gospel, Relationships

,