Another Advent prayer

Lord, prepare us for your Advent coming.

In our prayers today we try to come to you, sure that you will come the rest of the way.

Lord, prepare us for your coming - in the Church.

Clean out the unnecessary clutter of our church life, the piles of dead habits, the cupboards full of prejudice, the cobwebs of compromise and the sad rota of forgotten dreams. Open our church to the free flow of your refreshing Spirit. Give to our churches a new vision and hope. We want to belong to you again.

In particular, Lord, we pray for Your wisdom and guidance as St Matthew’s plans for the building project.

Lord, in your mercy hear our prayer.

Lord, prepare us for your coming - in the world.

Come, drive away despair from our politics; revive our dreams of justice; restore our passion for what is good, right and true. Establish your just and gentle rule in the Middle East and Afghanistan where peace has been powerless and violent people have had their day. Set a flame to the fuse of justice in Zimbabwe where arrogant people have defied the moral order year after year. Guard well the new springtime of hope in Northern Ireland where peace has come like a gift, wrapped in reconciliation and gladness.

In particular, Lord, we long for a just settlement to emerge from the Middle East peace talks

Lord, in your mercy hear our prayer.

Lord, prepare us for your coming - in our own community.

In the problems of our locality help us never to forget the supremacy of love. May love motivate our care for this neighbourhood. May love heal the social ills which drag us into despair. May love inspire our citizenship to rise beyond mediocrity. We name in our minds the problems locally of which we are aware of homelessness in our city and pray that love, gracious and practical, will find a way.

Lord, in your mercy hear our prayer.

Lord, prepare us for your coming - in those in need.

Give us eyes to search the face of the stranger and there to see the face of the Saviour. Give us sensitivity to hear the doubt and hesitation, and there, with that person, to share the confusion and the futility. There are those we know who are ill now, struggling this morning to handle the pain. Let us pray for them, for you come to us in them, and you ask for our love. We give that now, as we name them and love them in our hearts. What we have promised, in love and prayer, let us never forget to do.

Lord, in your mercy hear our prayer.

Advent Lord, come ever nearer. Come to rejuvenate our faith. Come to fortify our social conscience. Come to open wide our eyes of wonder. So that when the Saviour comes, he may steal into our hearts - and find them ready. Even so come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

(I am not sure where the inspiration for this prayer came from ... so I apologise if I have infringed copyright in it.)