All Hallows Evening Prayer for Wednesday Evening (April 21, 2021)

 

Evening Prayer

The Service of Light

Jesus Christ is the light of the world.
A light no darkness can extinguish.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Carl P. Daw Jr.’s evening hymn, “O Light Whose Splendor Thrills and Gladdens.”

O Light whose splendor thrills and gladdens
with radiance brighter than the sun,
pure gleam of God's unending glory,
O Jesus, blest Anointed One;

as twilight hovers near at sunset,
and lamps are lit, and children nod,
in evening hymns we lift our voices
to Father, Spirit, Son: one God.

In all life's brilliant, timeless moments,
let faithful voices sing your praise,
O Son of God, our Life-bestower,
whose glory lightens endless days.

Thanksgiving

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.

Blessed are you, O Lord Redeemer God,
You destroyed the bonds of death
and from the darkness of the tomb
drew forth the light of the world.
Led through the waters of death.
we become the children of light
singing our Alleluia
and dancing to the music of new life.
Pour out your Spirit upon us
that dreams and visions bring us
ever closer to the kingdom
of Jesus Christ our Risen Savior.
Through him and in the Holy Spirit
all glory be to you, Almighty Father,
this night and for ever and ever.
Amen.

Psalm 141 is sung and incense may be burned.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Tony Alphonso's arrangement of Psalm 141, “Like Burning Incense, O Lord.”

Like burning incense, O Lord,
let my rise to you.
Like burning incense, O Lord,
let my prayer rise to you.

1 I call out to you,
Come quickly to my aid.
My song cries out to you,
O listen to me now.
I raise my hands in off’ring to you.

Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)
Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)

2 Let me speak your truth;
watch over all I say.
Keep my thoughts on you;
let goodness rule my heart.
Keep me far from those who do harm.

Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)
Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)

3 Never let me dine
with those who seek to harm.
Keep your holy ones
always at my side.
Plant your wisdom deep in my soul.

Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)
Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)

4 I look to you for help;
I seek your loving eyes.
Guard my life for you;
Spare me from all wrong.
Keep all evil far from my heart.

Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)
Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)

5 Glory be to God
and to God’s only Son,
glory to the Spirit,
three in one,
now and for ever. Amen.

Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)
Like burning incense, O Lord,
(Like burning incense, O Lord,)
let my prayer rise to you.
(let my prayer rise to you.)

Silence is kept.

Let the incense of our repentant prayer ascend before you, O Lord, and let your loving kindness descend upon us, that with purified minds we may sing your praises with the Church on earth and the whole heavenly host, and may glorify you forever and ever. Amen.

The Psalms

Open this link in a new tab to hear Daniel Kallman’s choral arrangement of Jonathan Asprey’s paraphrase of Psalm 84, “How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place.”

How lovely is thy dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.
My soul is longing and fainting,
The courts of the Lord to see.
My heart and flesh, they are singing,
For joy to the living God.
How lovely is thy dwelling-place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.

Even the sparrow finds a home,
Where he can settle down.
And the swallow she can build a nest,
Where she may lay her young.
Within the court of the Lord of hosts,
My King, my Lord and my God.
And happy are those who are dwelling where
The song of praise is sung.

And I’d rather be a door-keeper
And only stay a day,
Than live the life of a sinner
And have to stay away.
For the Lord is shining as the sun,
And the Lord, he’s like a shield;
And no good thing does God withhold
From those who walk the way.

How lovely is thy dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.
My soul is longing and fainting,
The courts of the Lord to see.
My heart and flesh, they are singing,
For joy to the living God.
How lovely is thy dwelling-place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.

Silence is kept.

Lord God,
sustain us in this vale of tears
with the vision of your grace and glory,
that, strengthened by the bread of life,
we may come to your eternal dwelling place;
in the power of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Christopher Idle’s paraphrase of the Gloria in Excelsis Deo.

1 Glory in the highest to the God of heaven!
Peace to all your people through the earth be given!
Mighty God and Father, thanks and praise we bring,
singing hallelujah to our heavenly king.

2 Jesus Christ is risen, God the Father's Son!
With the Holy Spirit you are Lord alone!
Lamb once killed for sinners, all our guilt to bear,
show us now your mercy, now receive our prayer.

3 Christ the world's true Saviour, high and holy One,
seated now and reigning from your Father's throne:
Lord and God, we praise you! Highest heaven adores:
in the Father's glory, all the praise be yours!

The Proclamation of the Word

The Reading

Isaiah 6: 1-13 A Vision of God in the Temple

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said:

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.’

The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said: ‘Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!’

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: ‘Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.’ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’ And he said, ‘Go and say to this people:

“Keep listening, but do not comprehend;
keep looking, but do not understand.”
Make the mind of this people dull,
and stop their ears,
and shut their eyes,
so that they may not look with their eyes,
and listen with their ears,
and comprehend with their minds,
and turn and be healed.’
Then I said, ‘How long, O Lord?’ And he said:
‘Until cities lie waste
without inhabitant,
and houses without people,
and the land is utterly desolate;
until the Lord sends everyone far away,
and vast is the emptiness in the midst of the land.
Even if a tenth part remains in it,
it will be burned again,
like a terebinth or an oak
whose stump remains standing
when it is felled.’
The holy seed is its stump.

Silence is kept.

May your word live in us
and bear much fruit to your glory.

The Homily

Hidden Treasures of God’s Grace

Have you ever gone to sleep, dreamed, and then woke up with a particular thought on your mind? I took a nap and dreamt I was grubbing in a hole for treasure—gold doubloons, silver dollars, and paper money, greenbacks, all mixed with the dirt. Some children asked me what I was doing. I explained that I was looking for treasure that was hidden in the dirt. It was scattered in the hole in which I was grubbing, and I had to sift the dirt to find it. They asked me if they could help me. I think that I told them “no.” I do not remember very much beyond that point.

I woke up with this thought on my mind. How different is the way that the world encourages us to act toward others from the way that Jesus encourages us to act toward them. What a difference Jesus can make in our lives when we open our hearts and minds to him. We become different people.

The world encourages us to have no interest in the feelings of others or sympathy toward their feelings. The world encourages us to adopt an uncaring attitude toward them. Their feelings are not our concern.

The world also encourages us to be unkind and hateful towards others, to see them as less than human beings. Teenagers will gang up on one of their schoolmates and bully them at school and online. They will act in a very spiteful manner toward them, repeatedly seeking to hurt them and to damage their self-esteem. For teenagers how their peers see them is an important measure of their self-worth. Some teenagers have become depressed and committed suicide as a result of such bulling.

Teenagers will also bully young people whom they do know. The degree of the malice and ill-will that they show toward their victim is a convincing argument in support of the belief in the total depravity of humankind.

This belief holds that we are inclined to do evil to our fellow human beings. God’s grace working in the world, working in us, working in others, however, places a restraining hand on us. At the same time God’s grace not only encourages us to do good to our fellow human beings but also enables us to do good to them.

God did not create humanity to do evil, but the human race became “bent,” to use the word the Christian apologist C. S. Lewis uses to explain the human condition in his science fiction novel Out of the Silent Planet, to the point that we acquired an inclination to do evil. Without God’s intervention humanity would do far greater evil than we do. The good in the world is God’s doing, not our own. It is God’s grace working in the world, in ourselves, in others.

We see the proclivity to do evil in older people as well as young ones. Older people talk about colleagues and coworkers behind their backs. They spread malicious gossip and do other things to harm the reputation of someone to whom they have taken a dislike or whom they see as a competitor or rival. They bear grudges and, whenever the opportunity arises, do what they can to cause harm to the one against whom they hold a grudge.

On social media one will find individuals who identify themselves as Christians, followers of Jesus, vilifying those with whom they disagree, portraying them as wicked and beneath contempt and talking about them in the harshest terms. One will find other self-identified Christians egging them on. Like sharks that smell blood, they may join in the attack. The lessons in which Jesus schooled his disciples and which are recorded in the gospels appear to have been forgotten or unheeded, heard but disregarded. Or worse, untaught.

As we have seen in recent days, both young people and older people can turn to violence. They can take the lives of others who have done them no wrong except in their imagination.

In today’s reading the prophet Isaiah has a vision of God in his temple. Isaiah is, in the presence of a holy God, painfully aware of his sinfulness. He is a man of unclean lips and he lives among a people of unclean lips. One of the seraphs, one of the six-winged angels that surround God’s throne and praise God unceasingly, flies to Isaiah. The seraph holds a live coal taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touches Isaiah’s mouth with the burning coal and says: ‘Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.’

An angel has not touched our lips with a burning coal. God himself, in the person of the Son, in the person of Jesus, has suffered and died for our sake on the cross. With his blood Jesus has washed away our guilt and sin.

To offer himself for the sins of the whole world was not Jesus’ only mission in the world. It was also to teach and show us how we should live. Jesus’ teaching and example are more than the teaching and example of a wise philosopher or sage. As Jesus told his first disciples, “I have not spoken on my own, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment about what to say and what to speak.”

The way that Jesus taught and showed us how we should live is the way that God desires that we should live. Just as God has been merciful to us, Jesus taught and showed us, we are to be merciful to others. By being merciful as God is merciful, we show that we are truly his children, the children of the Most High.

While the world may be cold and uncaring, we are to be tenderhearted and compassionate. While the world may beat down, we are to uplift. While the world may be cruel and hate-filled, we are to be kind and loving. While the world may unforgiving, we are to forgive. The graciousness that God has shown us, we are to show to all people no matter who they are, no matter what their walk is in life, no matter the color of their skin, the language that they speak, or the land where they originated.

How are we to live in accordance with such a high standard? By God’s grace, the power of his presence working in us, and with hearts and minds open to his grace. God is working in each of us to will and do what is pleasing to him. God is working in those around us. God is working in the world. It is God’s grace that enables us to take our first steps on the path of salvation. It is God’s grace that enables us to live the way Jesus taught and showed us. It is God’s grace that enables us to become more like our Savior and Lord and to serves as his agents in the world. It is God’s grace that enable us to be the instruments of his grace.

As for my dream, I may have been sifting the earth for treasures of God’s grace in my life, the treasures of God’s grace in the lives of others. All the good qualities in ourselves, all the good qualities in others, are God’s gift to us and to those whose lives have in some way become interconnected with ours. It may have been God’s way of telling me to devote more time to discovering these qualities in others, the good things that God has given them and myself—their hidden treasures. Sometimes the things that are the most precious, the things that are worth cherishing, are right under our noses and yet we do notice them as we are preoccupied with the busyness of our lives.

Silence is kept.

The Gospel Canticle

Open this link in a new tab to hear the Carl P. Daw Jr. 's paraphrase of the Magnificat, "My Soul Proclaims with Wonder."

Refrain:
My soul proclaims with wonder
the greatness of the Lord;
rejoicing in God's goodness,
my spirit is restored.

For God has looked with favor,
on one the world thought frail;
and blessings through the ages will echo
the angel's first "All hail."
Refrain

God's mercy shields the faithful
and gives them safe retreat
to arms that turns to scatter
the proud in their conceit.
Refrain

The mighty have been vanquished;
the lowly lifted up.
The hungry find abundance;
the rich, an empty cup.
Refrain

To Abraham's descendants
the Lord will steadfast prove,
for God has made with Israel
a covenant of love.
Refrain

Intercessions

Let us complete our evening prayer to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For peace from on high and our salvation, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For the welfare of all churches and for the unity of the human family, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For (name), our bishop, and (name), our pastor, and for all ministers of the Gospel, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For our nation, its government, and for all who serve and protect us, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For this city (town, university, monastery…). For every city and community, and for all those living in them, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For the good earth which God has given us and for the wisdom and will to conserve it, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For the safety of travelers, the recovery of the sick, the care of the destitute and the release of prisoners, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For an angel of peace to guide and protect us, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For a peaceful evening and a night free from sin, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

For a Christian end to our lives and for all who have fallen asleep in Christ, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord have mercy.

In the communion of the Holy Spirit (and of all the saints), let us commend ourselves and one another to the living God through Christ our Lord.
To you, O Lord.

Free Prayer

In silent or spontaneous prayer all bring before God the concerns of the day.

The Collect

Gracious Father,
who in your great mercy made glad the disciples
with the sight of the risen Lord:
give us such an awareness of his presence with us
that we may be strengthened and sustained by his risen life,
and serve you continually in righteousness and truth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lord's Prayer

The Lord’s Prayer is said.

And now, as our Saviour has taught us,
we are bold to say,

Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power, and the glory
for ever and ever.
Amen.

Dismissal

Open this link in a new tab to hear Beverlee Paine’s worship song, “Be Like Your Father.”

But I say unto you, love your enemies
and pray for those who hurt you.
Give to those who ask, don’t turn away.

And be like your Father in heaven above
who causes his sun to shine on evil and good,
and sends down his rain to quench all our thirst.
In him we live and move and have our being.

If you forgive each other, so will God forgive you.
Do not judge lest you be judg’d yourselves.

And be like your Father in heaven above
who causes his sun to shine on evil and good,
and sends down his rain to quench all our thirst.
In him we live and move and have our being.

When you see the hungry, feed them from your table.
For the poor and weary be their wat’ring place.

And be like your Father in heaven above
who causes his sun to shine on evil and good,
and sends down his rain to quench all our thirst.
In him we live and move and have our being.

Love your enemies
and pray for those who hurt you.
Give to those who ask, don’t turn away.

And be like your Father in heaven above
who causes his sun to shine on evil and good,
and sends down his rain to quench all our thirst.
In him we live and move and have our being.

Be like your Father in heaven above
who causes his sun to shine on evil and good,
and sends down his rain to quench all our thirst.
In him we live and move and have our being.

The version of this song on the video is an older version of the song. “All our thirst” was originally “all men’s thirst’” “forgive each other,” “forgive your brother.”

The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Let us praise the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

May the God of peace, who brought again
from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ,
the great shepherd of the sheep,
through the blood of the everlasting covenant,
make us perfect in every good work to do his will,
working in us what is pleasing in his sight.
Amen.