A Call to Worship

Here’s a call to worship that my church will be using this week that I adapted from the awesome Valley of Vision, one of the Books You Should Read:

Eternal Father,
You are good beyond all thought,
But I am vile, wretched, miserable, blind;
My lips are ready to confess,
   but my heart is slow to feel,
   and my ways reluctant to amend.
I bring my soul to You;
   break it, wound it, bend it, mold it.
Unmask to me sin’s deformity,
   that I may hate it, abhor it, flee from it.

All my sins I mourn, lament and for them cry forgiveness.
Work in me more profound and abiding repentance;
Give me the fullness of a godly grief
   that trembles and fears,
   yet ever trusts and loves,
   which is ever powerful, and ever confident;
Grant that through tears of repentance
   I may see more clearly the brightness
   and glories of the saving cross.

THE call to worship

On the topic of the previous post

“There can only be one call to worship, and this comes at conversion, when in complete repentance we admit to worshiping falsely, trapped by the inversion and enslaved to false gods before whom we have been dying sacrifices. This call to true worship comes but once, not every Sunday, in spite of the repeated calls to worship that begin most liturgies and orders of worship. These should not be labeled calls to worship but calls to continuation of worship.”

This comes from Harold Best’s book, Music Through the Eyes of Faith, which is also on the Books You Should Read list.