Morning Prayer: Tuesday 22 November 2016

November 22, 2016

Cecilia, Martyr, c.230
Morning Prayer – Week D

O Lord, open our lips:
and our mouth shall proclaim your praise.

Glory to the Father and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit;*
as it was in the beginning, is now, and shall be for ever.
Amen.

PSALMODY

Antiphon: Lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness;*
make your way straight before me. (Ps. 5.8)

Opening

VENITE

1 O come let us sing out to the Lord,*
let us shout in triumph to the rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his face with thanksgiving*
and cry out to him joyfully in psalms.
3 For the Lord is a great God,*
and a great king above all gods.
4 In his hands are the depths of the earth,*
and the peaks of the mountains are his also.
5 The sea is his and he made it;*
his hands moulded dry land.
6 Come let us worship and bow down,*
and kneel before the Lord our maker.
7 For he himself is our God;*
we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
8 Today if only you would hear his voice:*
‘Do not harden your hearts as Israel did in the wilderness;
9 when your fathers tested me;*
put me to proof though they had seen my works.
10 Of whom I swore in my wrath:*
“They shall not enter my rest.”’

Glory to the Father… (may be said by all)

or (from Psalm 5)

1 In the morning, Lord, you hear my voice;*
early in the morning I make my appeal and watch for you.
2 Through the greatness of your mercy I will go into your house;*
I will bow down toward your holy temple in awe of you.
3 All who take refuge in you will be glad;*
they will sing out their joy for ever.
4 You will shelter them,*
so that those who love your name may exult in you.

Glory to the Father…

or a suitable hymn

Psalm 113

1 Hallelujah!
Give praise, you servants of the Lord;*
praise the name of the Lord.
2 Let the name of the Lord be blessed,*
from this time forth for evermore.
3 From the rising of the sun to its going down*
let the name of the Lord be praised.
4 The Lord is high above all nations,*
and his glory above the heavens.
5 Who is like the Lord our God, who sits enthroned on high,*
but stoops to behold the heavens and the earth?
6 He takes up the weak out of the dust*
and lifts up the poor from the ashes.
7 He sets them with the princes,*
with the princes of his people.
8 He makes the woman of a childless house*
to be a joyful mother of children.

We magnify your name, O Lord, in all times and places. You subdue the arrogant and raise the humble; you feed the hungry and reveal the poverty of wealth. We give thanks for your salvation, made known in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Conclusion (from Isaiah 66)

1 Rejoice with Jerusalem and exult in her,*
all you who love her.
2 Share her joy with all your heart,*
all you who mourn over her.
3 Then you may suck and be fed from her breasts,*
delighting in her plentiful milk.
4 For thus says the Lord, I will send peace flowing over her like a river,*
and the wealth of nations like a stream in flood;
5 you shall be carried in her arms,*
and rocked upon her knees.
6 As a mother comforts her child,*
so will I myself comfort you, and you shall find strength in Jerusalem.
7 This you shall see and be glad at heart;*
your limbs shall be as the fresh grass in spring.*
8 Then I myself will gather all nations;*
and they shall come and behold my glory.

Glory to the Father…

Antiphon: Lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness;
make your way straight before me.

READING(S)

Zechariah 11:4-17

Thus said the Lord my God: Be a shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. Those who buy them kill them and go unpunished; and those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the Lord, for I have become rich’; and their own shepherds have no pity on them. For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of the earth, says the Lord. I will cause them, every one, to fall each into the hand of a neighbour, and each into the hand of the king; and they shall devastate the earth, and I will deliver no one from their hand.

So, on behalf of the sheep dealers, I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. I took two staffs; one I named Favour, the other I named Unity, and I tended the sheep. In one month I disposed of the three shepherds, for I had become impatient with them, and they also detested me. So I said, ‘I will not be your shepherd. What is to die, let it die; what is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed; and let those that are left devour the flesh of one another!’ I took my staff Favour and broke it, annulling the covenant that I had made with all the peoples. So it was annulled on that day, and the sheep dealers, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the Lord. I then said to them, ‘If it seems right to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.’ So they weighed out as my wages thirty shekels of silver. Then the Lord said to me, ‘Throw it into the treasury’—this lordly price at which I was valued by them. So I took the thirty shekels of silver and threw them into the treasury in the house of the Lord. Then I broke my second staff Unity, annulling the family ties between Judah and Israel.

Then the Lord said to me: Take once more the implements of a worthless shepherd. For I am now raising up in the land a shepherd who does not care for the perishing, or seek the wandering, or heal the maimed, or nourish the healthy, but devours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hoofs.
Oh, my worthless shepherd,
who deserts the flock!
May the sword strike his arm
and his right eye!
Let his arm be completely withered,
his right eye utterly blinded!

1 Corinthians 3:10-23

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. Each builder must choose with care how to build on it. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ.Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— the work of each builder will become visible, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each has done. If what has been built on the foundation survives, the builder will receive a reward. If the work is burned, the builder will suffer loss; the builder will be saved, but only as through fire.

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

Do not deceive yourselves. If you think that you are wise in this age, you should become fools so that you may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written,
‘He catches the wise in their craftiness’,
and again,
‘The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise,
that they are futile.’
So let no one boast about human leaders. For all things are yours,whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all belong to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.

Silence

Response (Ps. 33.18)

The eye of the Lord is upon those who fear him.
The eye of the Lord is upon those who fear him.
On those who wait upon his love
On those who fear him.
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
The eye of the Lord is upon those who fear him.

BENEDICTUS

Benedictus Antiphon: God has remembered* his holy covenant.

1 Blessed be the Lord the God of Israel,*
for he has come to his people and set them free.
2 He has raised up for us a mighty saviour,*
born of the house of his servant David.
3 Through his holy prophets he promised of old*
that he would save us from our enemies,
from the hands of all that hate us.
4 He promised to show mercy to our forebears,*
and to remember his holy covenant.
5 This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham:*
to set us free from the hands of our enemies,
6 free to worship him without fear,*
holy and righteous in his sight all the days of our life.
7 You my child shall be called the prophet of the Most High,*
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way,
8 to give his people knowledge of salvation*
by the forgiveness of all their sins.
9 In the tender compassion of our God*
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
10 to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death,*
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Glory to the Father… (may be said by all)

Benedictus Antiphon: God has remembered* his holy covenant.

PRAYERS

Lord, have mercy upon us.
Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Do not bring us to the time of trial,
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours,
now and for ever.
Amen.

Collect of the Day
Stir up, O Lord, the wills of your faithful people: that they, richly bearing the fruit of good works, may by you be richly rewarded; through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.
Amen.

God most holy, we give you thanks for bringing us out of the shadow of night into the light of morning; and we ask you for the joy of spending this day in your service, so that when evening comes, we may once more give you thanks, through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Let us bless the Lord:
Thanks be to God!

The Lord bless us and preserve us from all evil;
and bring us to life eternal.
Amen.