Baptism

Drown my Transgressions

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

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O Father in heaven,
I come to You in lowliness of heart
begging You to drown my transgressions
in the sea of You own infinite love.

My failure to be true even to my own accepted standards,
My self-deception in the face of temptation,
My choosing the worse when I know the better,
       O Lord, forgive.
My failure to apply to myself the standards of conduct I demand of others,
My blindness to the suffering of others
   and my slowness to be taught by my own,
My complacence toward wrongs that do not touch my own case
   and my over-sensitiveness to those that do,
My slowness to see the good in my fellows
   and to see the evil in myself,
My hardness of heart towards my neighbors’ faults
   and my readiness to make allowance for my own,
My unwillingness to believe that You have called me to a small work
   and my brother to a great one.
      O Lord, forgive.

John Baillie, 1886–1960, Scottish theologian
A Diary of Private Prayer, slightly edited
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Psalm 51:10-12

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
    and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence,
    and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
    and uphold me with a willing spirit. 

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Questions

What is it like for you when you come clean 

    and confess your heart’s attitudes to God?  
Have you ever felt cleansed and renewed by God’s spirit?

prepare the way to You

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image / Maxpixel / CC0
 
Lord Jesus Christ, listen to the voice of our distress 
    in the desert of penitents crying out to you;
    that we may not be deceived 
    by the falsehood of discussion in nobility of birth, 
    from superstition of religion, 
    from curiosity of knowledge tempting us; 
grant us to prepare the way to you by abandoning sin,
    by the purpose of repenting,
    by the remission of wrongs,
    by contempt of temporal things,
    and by the observing of the commandments.
May your paths be made straight in us 
    by the renunciation of our own will, feeling, self-confidence,
    by the spending over and above of deliberations;
that in the house of Bethany of obedience 
    baptized with the water of true contrition, 
    with the Holy Spirit and with fire across Jordan, 
    and after the river of the last judgment 
we may perfectly know you,   
    the Mediator of virtue and knowledge, 
    the Mediator of God and men.
 
St. Albert the Great, 1206-1280, German Dominican
 
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Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, 
    so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith,
    just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit,
    according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, 
    and not according to Christ. 
For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, 
    and you have been filled in him,    
    who is the head of all rule and authority.
 

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