Ash Wednesday Prayers
Ash Wednesday Evening Communion Prayer
Holy God,
we remember this night,
that we were created by your hands,
molded out of dust,
animated by your breath,
bound to return to that dust again.
And in our best moments,
we remember we are yours.
In our best moments,
we know what we are made for.
But during this dusty in-between, God,
there is so much that distracts us from your promise.
We find ourselves standing on heaps of ash of our own making,
rubble left from chaos we create,
pieces of relationships broken,
remnants of lists that can’t get done,
messes left by lives lived without intention.
God, we find ourselves overwhelmed by the clutter,
fragments of things we’ve broken
covering us like dust,
dimming our eyes to the light of your promise.
So God, we gather around your table
carrying with us our dust and clutter,
needing you to meet us here,
needing you to feed in us what hungers,
and ignite in us what tires,
and comfort the things in us that can’t be still.
We gather around your table,
needing you to do what only you can do,
needing you to scoop up the dust we have made,
shape it and form it and redeem it,
needing you to mark us again as yours,
assure us that we don’t travel alone.
So God meet us and mark us here.
Redeem in us what you can,
and clean us and free us of everything else.
Let this Lent leave us differently than it finds us tonight,
as we journey together
seeking you in this season.
So we pray here at your table
in the name of the one who walked this broken path too,
who showed us there is no length you will not go to
to redeem your dusty creatures.
We pray in the name of Christ,
who taught us to pray by saying, Our Father…
Ash Wednesday Embodiment Prayer
God of all that was, and is, and will be,
we pray to you this day with our entire beings,
offering up to you the unexamined parts of ourselves.
So God we give you our hearts,
and ask that you search them, and clean them.
Rid us of the things we’ve held onto for too long.
Free us of the finite, futile things we’ve distracted ourselves with.
Fill in the cracks,
the broken and missing pieces,
with goodness that flows from you, and you alone.
Hear us God, while we open our hearts to you.
(allow silence)
God of all,
we pray to you this day with our entire beings,
offering up to you the unexamined parts of ourselves.
So God we ask you to open our minds,
to awaken the tired and closed off parts of our thinking,
to clean away the mantras that no longer serve us,
to rid us of the internal tapes that don’t lead us to serving you.
Fix our minds, holy God,
that we might come to think as you think,
to wonder as you wonder,
to imagine as beautifully as you do.
Hear us God, while we open our minds to you.
(allow silence)
God of all,
we pray to you this day with our entire beings,
offering up to you the unexamined parts of ourselves.
So God we ask you to wrap our bodies
in your compassion and care.
Hold tightly the parts of us that ache, God,
and let us find renewed courage,
for these to be the vessels that carry your love through this world.
So renew our legs, our feet,
let there be rest from the races we shouldn’t be running,
that we might be ready to chase you all over this city.
Renew our hands, our arms,
make us let go of all the weight we’ve been carrying,
and find freedom to embrace your children and dance in your light.
Renew our eyes, our lips,
release the tension we bear across our foreheads,
let our tongues relax inside our mouths,
that we might speak more of your good news,
that we might find comfort in our own silence.
Hear us God, while we recommit our bodies to you.
(allow silence)
So God of all,
we pray to you this day with our entire beings,
offering ourselves together, to you,
as your church, as your people,
each of us on our own journey,
gifted with community to travel with,
marked in ash and wanting to be your body together in this world.
So hear us, we pray, as we commit our community to you,
praying together as you taught us: Our Father…
