HOW TO USE THIS RESOURCE
These posts will be organized around the four weeks of Advent, beginning November 28, 2021. There are five entries per week. Each day, you’ll read and mediate on an opening scripture and you’ll confess your sins with a guided prayer of confession and assurance. You’ll then read a Psalm, a selected Old Testament passage, and a New Testament passage. We’ve provided a question for reflection each day to help identify important threads in those scriptures. The scripture readings are intended to compliment the sermon from the previous Sunday.
We’ll also be reading the Apostles Creed and the Lord’s Prayer each day. Why do this? The Apostle’s Creed reminds us of the essence of our faith. We are believers who believe this. There is power in rehearsing over and over the Good News we’ve given our lives to. In praying the Lord’s Prayer, we’re praying the very words Jesus gave to His disciples when they asked, “Lord, teach us to pray.” Christians have been practicing this prayer daily for centuries. It’s good for us to pray as the Lord Himself prayed.
We’ve also provided prayer prompts and space for your own personal requests. As important as it is to pray the words of Jesus, scripture also invites us to “make our requests known to God” (Phil. 4:6). You can use this space to record and pray for any pressing issues in your life or the life of our church.
The final entry of this blog series will be for use on Christmas Day and it will be structured like the other days. You could use this the morning of Christmas before opening gifts or over Christmas dinner with your family or in the quiet, waning moments of Christmas night.
These posts are designed either for personal or family use. It’s our hope that the Spirit will use this to turn our eyes towards Jesus during Advent and Christmas, “the Everlasting Wonder” of the Incarnation -- instead of getting swept up in the parties and commercials and gift-buying and schedule-making and cookie-baking (as wonderful as those things can be).
May Jesus be made known to, in, and through The Church at Greer Station!
Read & meditate
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Philippians 1:2
Confession of sin
Have mercy on us, Father, for we have grown disinterested in the truest love story-- of a merciful savior descending from on high to rescue his people. We have forsaken our first love. Our duty is evident but our affections for you have dulled, and we are known not by our love. We are hoarders of the grace and mercy that has been lavished upon us, keeping it all for ourselves. We heralded your first coming, the fulfillment of all of our longings, yet we have neglected to herald your second coming.
Spirit, awaken us to the glorious news of the Savior who is Immanuel from on high. Soften our “scroogely” hearts to your loving-kindness, which did not begin when you transformed our hearts, or when Christ suffered wrath on the cross, or even the night a long awaited king was born with no place to lay his head. Your loving-kindness, Lord, is from eternity past and your kingdom of peace will know no end. Compel us Christ, with your love.
Written by Sarah Gilliam
ASsurance of pardon
Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
Romans 5:1-2
scripture reading
Day 1 - Psalm 95 / Genesis 49 / John 1:1-18 / How has and does God speak to us?
Day 2 - Psalm 96 / Deut. 18:15-22 / John 1:19-34 / The Lord comes to judge the earth (Ps.96:13). How does this fit with the coming of “Lamb who comes to take away the sins of the world"?
Day 3 - Psalm 97 / Jeremiah 23:1-8 / John 5:19-37 / How is Jesus the completion of the promise in Jeremiah 23?
Day 4 - Psalm 98 / Micah 5 / John 10:1-21 / What marvelous things (Ps. 98:1) has the Lord done in Christ?
Day 5 - Psalm 100 / Zeph. 3:14-20 / John 18:25-33 / Who does the singing in this Psalm and Zephaniah? What is the basis of our singing?
RECITE THE APOSTLE'S CREED
I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic* Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the
resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.
PRAY THE LORD'S PRAYER
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name,
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Personal Prayer
Petitions (requests for yourself – work, decisions, growth in Christ, fighting sin, etc.)
Intercessions (requests for others – our church, the global church, our nation, family, friends, etc.)
Mission (pray for lost friends & family, missionaries, unreached people groups, etc.)
Thanksgiving (gratitude to God for health, blessings, salvation, etc.)
Concluding Prayer
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all evermore. Amen.
*In saying we believe in “the holy catholic Church,” we are confessing our belief in the universal people of God across all times and places (lower-case "c" catholic), not the Roman Catholic Church (big "C" Catholic).