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Communion:
Invitation to Communion (Psalm 139, Luke 14)
The bread is ready, the cup is filled, the table is set. Let all who are hungry for the love of God, come and be fed. Let all who are thirsty for new life, come and share the cup. Let all who want to follow Jesus, come and join the feast.
The Lord is here.
His Spirit is with us.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give thanks and praise.
Praise be unto you, God of the prophets, for you have taken in your own two hands the redemption of your world and refashioned us from brokenness into life everlasting with you. Like a potter you fashioned your chosen people, making them into a vessel worthy of your glory. When that vassal was spoiled you called your people to repentance and sent prophets to renew their faith. In the fullness of time, through the death and resurrection of your Son, you reworked the clay like a potter at a wheel, and remade a vessel revealing your goodness and grace through the forgiveness of sins, raising us up from the dust of the earth to the hope of everlasting life. And so with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven we praise your name and join their unending hymn.
Holy, holy, holy Lord,
God of power and God of might,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
Hosanna in the highest.
God of love, you welcome us at this table as brothers and sisters in a new family. Shape our life together by the way we belong to one another in you. Send your Holy Spirit upon your church to make us faithful witnesses to your beloved community. Sanctify this bread and cup that they may be for us the body and blood of your Son; who, at supper with his disciples, took bread, gave you thanks, broke the bread, and gave it to them, saying, “Take, eat: This is my body which is given for your; do this in remembrance of me.” After supper he took the cup. Again he gave you thanks, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Drink this, all of you: this is my blood for the forgiveness of sins. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” Great is the mystery of faith.
Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again.
Creating and re-creating God, you are the potter and we are the clay. Renew your church today in the touch of your hands. Search and know the places that are broken and the hearts that long to be mended. Form your people in faithfulness to Jesus. Shape us to be his disciples, to take up our cross and follow him. Have your own way with us, Lord: mold us and make us, search us and try us, touch us and heal us, till all shall see Christ only, always, living in us. Bring us at last to the blessed day when we are one with the family of saints gathered around your throne, in the company of the Holy Spirit, in union with Christ, Father most holy, now and always.
Amen
Prayer after Communion
Merciful God, you have called us to your table and fed us with the bread of life. Draw us and all people to serve your Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Amen.
(Eucharistic Prayers, Samuel Wells and Abigail Kocher)
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