(Confession) Acknowledgement of our sin and need for grace, drawn from Psalm 19:12-13: 

Father,  

As we assemble this morning and draw our thoughts to worship you, we see ourselves in light of your majesty and recognize that we are sinners. In our natural state, we are your enemies and committed to our own glory, our own law, and our own will. 

We thank you that through the perfect obedience and the sacrifice of Christ, there is forgiveness and fellowship given to us that we may hurry to approach you in Christ, and that in Christ we now delight in your law, your will, and your glory. 

But even in our redeemed state, this week has shown that we are frequently and willfully sinful. We often pursue temptation, we question your commands, we delight in affirming our own importance, and in times of difficulty we are fertile ground for the accusation that you are unjustly sorrowing us. We have been guilty of pride, we have not pursued your mind in your Word, we have procrastinated in prayer, we do not devote ourselves to the tools and disciplines that are critical to our walk with you. In omission and commission, openly and in private, we have tattered the law of Christ. 

Our failures and our shortcomings and Satan himself stand before us and accuse us at length and in painful detail. They affirm that we cannot be forgiven and that your grace is exhausted and your redemption is void, and that we ought to give ourselves over to our sins since we have so often stumbled into them.  

We thank you, Father, that no accusation that has been laid on Christ has any power over us. We praise you that you are a God who is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression, and sin (Exodus 34). We exalt you that in Christ, you love us as you do Christ Himself. 

Break the draw of sin upon our hearts, and exalt Christ in our affections; grant us the discipline and discipleship to be stirred up in holy pursuit of you, and by your Spirit that sanctifies us through your Word put any thought that is opposed to your sovereign rule to death.  

We thank you for your precious discipline that restores us to you; for bringing us into the furnace to burn away the dross; and for withholding what we demand, for our good. 

At this time, we also pray for our nation, Father. We praise you for the opportunities that we have to live tranquil and quiet lives in godliness and dignity (I Timothy 2). As we engage the great privilege of voting later this week, we pray that we might do so with joyful, reverent assurance that you rule over all in power and wisdom, that you remove and establish kings, and that every president, congressman, governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, state treasurer, prosecuting attorney, and judge who will enter, leave, or be retained in office does so only by your stated decree, and that every amendment and proposition that fails or passes is so by your wise and sovereign purpose. 

May our singing, our giving, our praying, our discipleship, and our hearing your Word be done in joy as we consider your forgiveness and grace and your sovereign power in all things. 

This we pray in Christ’s name, Amen.