deliverance

Jesus, fight for me against Satan

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
Lord Jehovah,
judge my cause and fight for me against Satan and his host.
Lay the strong one low!
 
I have cast off his yoke, and renounced his cursed power.
He doubly hates this, and longs to seize me as his prey.
 
I flee to you and to your cross for help.
He would win if you did not deliver me – but you have already defeated him.
 
Do not let him conquer me! Put him to shame, O Lord my God! 
Give me victory!
 
It is not strength that wins; my weakness is my shield.
In lowly trust we fight the fight, and weakness wins the battle.
 
So give me a lowly heart, and cast away each prideful thought.
Let gentleness and love come in instead, and abide in my life.
 
Your will, not mine, be done. I resist my selfish desires.
Let me ever and always be your servant only.
 
Jesus, I flee to you. I cling to your cross.
Save me from Satan’s hellish power and pluck me from his grasp.
 
So I will praise you, Lord, and adore your great name.
With Father and Spirit one, forever and ever, amen.
 
Ephrem the Syrian, c.306-373, Syrian hymn writer and theologian
 
____________________________
 
 
Be sober-minded; be watchful. 
Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 
Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering 
   are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. 
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, 
    who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, 
    will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. 
To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
 

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Son of God, deliver us

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Photo by Johannes Plenio via Pexels
 
You who guided Noah over the flood waves:
    Hear us.
You who with your word recalled Jonah from the deep:
    Deliver us.
You who stretched forth your hand to Peter as he sank:
    Help us, O Christ.
Son of God, who did marvelous things of old:
    Be favorable in our day also.
 
Scots Celtic Prayer
 
______________________
 
 
The Lord is king! He is robed in majesty.
    Indeed, the Lord is robed in majesty and armed with strength.
The world stands firm
    and cannot be shaken.
Your throne, O Lord, has stood from time immemorial.
    You yourself are from the everlasting past.
The floods have risen up, O Lord.
    The floods have roared like thunder;
    the floods have lifted their pounding waves.
But mightier than the violent raging of the seas,
    mightier than the breakers on the shore—
    the Lord above is mightier than these!
Your royal laws cannot be changed.
    Your reign, O Lord, is holy forever and ever.
 

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Lord, raise up my soul

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Gregory of Nazianzus, by Peter Paul Rubens via Wikimedia Commons
 
The breath of life, O Lord, seems spent.
My body is tense, my mind filled with anxiety,
Yet I have no zest, no energy.
I am helpless to allay my fears
I am incapable of relaxing my limbs.
Dark thoughts constantly invade my head,
And I have no power to resist them.
 
Was ever an oak tree buffeted by wind,
As the gales of melancholy now buffet my soul?
Was ever a ship tossed by the waves,
As my soul is now tossed by misery?
Did ever the foundation of a house crumble,
As my own life now crumbles to dust?
 
Friends no longer want to visit me.
You have driven away my spiritual brethren.
I am now an outcast from your church.
No longer the flowers want to bloom for me.
No longer the trees come into leaf for me.
No longer the birds sing at my window.
 
My fellow Christians condemn me as an idle sinner.
Lord, raise up my soul, revive my body.
 
Gregory of Nazianzus, 329-389, Archbishop of Constantinople
____________________
 
 
Hear my prayer, Lord;
    let my cry for help come to you.
Do not hide your face from me
    when I am in distress.
Turn your ear to me;
    when I call, answer me quickly.

For my days vanish like smoke;
    my bones burn like glowing embers.
My heart is blighted and withered like grass;
    I forget to eat my food.
In my distress I groan aloud
    and am reduced to skin and bones.
I am like a desert owl,
    like an owl among the ruins.
I lie awake; I have become
    like a bird alone on a roof.
All day long my enemies taunt me;
    those who rail against me use my name as a curse.
For I eat ashes as my food
    and mingle my drink with tears
 because of your great wrath,
    for you have taken me up and thrown me aside.
My days are like the evening shadow;
    I wither away like grass.

But you, Lord, sit enthroned forever;
    your renown endures through all generations.
You will arise and have compassion on Zion,
    for it is time to show favor to her;
    the appointed time has come.
 

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Jesus, Lord of Salvation

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
 
How is it, dearest Jesus, 
    that you graciously reached down to visit your chosen, 
    even so long before your time on earth? 
To tell your people that your thoughts were good, and not evil?
 
When you appeared to Joshua in human form 
    as Captain of the Lord’s host, 
he instantly knew your glorious character as Mediator, 
    and fell to the earth in adoration.
 
Hail then, you almighty Lord, you Captain of the Lord’s host,
    and of my salvation! 
You have entered the holy war and led captivity captive.  
You have fully conquered Satan and sin, and death, and hell, 
    for your people.
 
And you will surely conquer all those tremendous foes of ours, 
    in your people, and bruise Satan under our feet shortly. 
Indeed, dear Lord, you have already brought them under, 
    for by your sovereign grace in the hearts of your redeemed, 
    you have made your people “willing in the day of your power.”
 
By the sword of your Spirit, you have convinced my soul of sin, 
   and by the arrows of your quiver, 
    you have wounded my heart with deep contrition for sin. 
Lord, I fall before you, as your servant Joshua did, and worship you.
 
And with all the church of the redeemed, 
    both in heaven and earth, we cheerfully confess  
  “that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” 
Amen!
 
Robert Hawker, 1753-1827, Anglican Priest
 
_____________________
 
 
When Joshua was near the town of Jericho, 
    he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him 
    with sword in hand. 
Joshua went up to him and demanded, “Are you friend or foe?”
“Neither one,” he replied. “I am the commander of the Lord’s army.”

At this, Joshua fell with his face to the ground in reverence.

“I am at your command,” Joshua said. 
“What do you want your servant to do?”

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Separate us from forgiven sins

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image, Steve  F, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
 
Father, when You forgive sins, 
You separate them as far from us as the east is from the west
 
Bury them in the bottom of the deepest sea
and put up a sign for the devil that says,
NO FISHING.
 
Corrie Ten Boom, 1892-1983, Dutch Holocaust Survivor and author
 
______________________
 
 
For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
    so great is his love for those who fear him;
 as far as the east is from the west,
    so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
 

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expel the devil from this man

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image by Lawrence OP via Flickr
 
O Lord, holy Father,
almighty and eternal God,
expel the devil
and the paganism from this man,
    from his head, from his hair,
    from his brain, from his back,
    from his front, from his eyes,
    from his ears, from his nostrils,
    from his lips, from his mouth,
    from his tongue, from under his tongue,
    from his jaws, from his throat,
    from his neck, from his heart,
    from his whole body, from all of his members,
    from inside and the outside of him,
    from his bones, from his veins,
    from his nerves, from his blood,
    from his senses, from his thoughts,
    from his words, from all his works,
    from his strength,
    from all manner of conversation,
    for this, and in the life to come,.
But may the power of Christ, our mediator,
work in you, that we may attain life eternal,
through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, Amen.
 
Antiphonary of Bangor, Prayer over a Person who has a Devil, #96
 
___________________________
 
 
And he called to him his twelve disciples 
    and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, 
    and to heal every disease and every affliction.

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deliver and protect us, O Lord

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Son of God, Viktor Vasnetsov, Wikimedia commons
 
 
O Lord God, strength of our health
    who avenges the poor and maintains the cause of the helpless,
  deliver us, O Lord,
    and preserve us from the evil and the wicked,
    that neither their example may corrupt us,
    nor their counsels mislead us,
    nor their prosperity scandalize us,
    nor their strife disquiet us,
    nor their mischief disturb our safety;
but do cover our heads in the day of battle and contestation
    against all our bodily and ghostly enemies;
    that although they hunt us to overthrow us,
  yet we may prosper on earth under your favor and protection,
    and at last, being removed from all fears and sadness and dangers,
    may continue in your sight among the congregation of the just forever,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.
 
Jeremy Taylor, 1613–1667, English cleric, imprisoned during the Protectorate
 
________________________
 
 

Guard me, O Lord, from the hands of the wicked;                                                                                  preserve me from violent men,
    who have planned to trip up my feet.
The arrogant have hidden a trap for me,
    and with cords they have spread a net;
    beside the way they have set snares for me. 

I say to the Lord, You are my God;
    give ear to the voice of my pleas for mercy, O Lord!
O Lord, my Lord, the strength of my salvation,
    you have covered my head in the day of battle.
Grant not, O Lord, the desires of the wicked;
    do not further their evil plot, or they will be exalted!

 

God of glory, Hear me, Spare me, Give me

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
 
God of glory,
you alone are true,
you alone are just.
In you are all things.
By you all things were made.
Hear my prayer,  O Lord,
just as you heard the three young men
    in the fury furnace.
Hear my prayer,
just as you heard Susanna and freed her
    from the hands of two enemy witnesses.
Hear me,
just as you heard Peter on the sea,
    and Paul in his chains.
Spare my soul.
Spare me from my deeds and from my sins.
Give me, O Lord, a holy mind to know you,
a perception that understands you,
a soul which knows you,
which seeks after the wisdom
    you have brought to me,
a soul that knows you,
a heart that loves you,
a mind that thinks about your works,
eyes that see you,
a tongue that proclaims you,
associations that are pleasing to you,
endurance that holds on to you,
perseverance that waits for your final completeness,
    at your resurrection 
    and the good reward you will give us, O Lord;
who lives and reigns forever. Amen.
 
Book of Cerne, 9th century
 
_______________________________
 
 
For thus says the Lord God: 
Behold, I, I myself will search for my sheep and will seek them out. 
As a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his sheep 
that have been scattered, so will I seek out my sheep, 
and I will rescue them from all places where they have been scattered 
on a day of clouds and thick darkness.

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to learn repentance and avoid sin

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment

Photo by fauve othon on Unsplash

 
Lord Christ, grant to us your servants 
    the blessing of learning the discipline of repentance.
And as we learn repentance, 
    it is also good for us to learn to avoid sin –
    so we will have no need to repent.
 
Those who have escaped a shipwreck 
    generally tend to avoid ships and the sea in the future.
By keeping fresh the memory of disaster,
    they honor the second chance you gave them.
They honor their deliverance,
    and are not willing to tempt your mercy all over again.
 
We have escaped once.
Now let us allow ourselves to experience sin’s danger that far only –
    and no farther!
Even if it seems that chances are good for us to escape a second time.
 
Tertullian, c. 155 AD – c. 220 AD, Theologian from Carthage, North Africa
 
_________________________
 
 
I am not sorry that I sent that severe letter to you, though I was sorry at first, 
    for I know it was painful to you for a little while. 
Now I am glad I sent it, not because it hurt you, 
    but because the pain caused you to repent and change your ways. 
It was the kind of sorrow God wants his people to have, 
    so you were not harmed by us in any way. 
For the kind of sorrow God wants us to experience leads us away from sin 
    and results in salvation. 
There’s no regret for that kind of sorrow. 
But worldly sorrow, which lacks repentance, results in spiritual death.
 

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Incarnate yourself into our hopelessness

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image / The Flight to Egypt / James Tissot
 
 
God of the homeless, the refugee, the displaced:
    we come expectant and hopeful before you.
In the world around us today
    we find ourselves surrounded by those, like Christ,
    without a place to simply be.
A season of blessing, our season of rain,
    is a curse for those without shelter.
 
You know what it is like to be displaced from your home,
    your family expelled from Israel out of fear of Herod.
In the same way, people flee their homes in fear of earthy leaders,
    uncertain of what the future may hold.
Those whose lands have been taken from them
    despair at the loss of valuable assets and resources.
 
Lord of hope, we are assured of your provision in this season
    where we expect the Bread of Life.
We are assured that you come to be with those who lack,
    those on the periphery, 
    as we remember you being born in a manger.
 
We are assured that your hand is outstretched to all,
    first to the poor and then to the rich,
    as shepherds and then magi came to the place of your birth.
Incarnate in hopeless situations for us, your people, we pray.
Amen.
 
complied by Claudio Carvalhaes, professor of worship in New York City
 
________________________
 

After the wise men were gone, 
    an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. 
“Get up! Flee to Egypt with the child and his mother,” the angel said. 
“Stay there until I tell you to return, 
    because Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

That night Joseph left for Egypt with the child and Mary, his mother, 
    and they stayed there until Herod’s death. 
This fulfilled what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: 
    “I called my Son out of Egypt.”

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