I’ve always attended Baptist churches regularly which use pretty much no liturgy, definitely nothing regular. But growing up in a town with a fantastic ecumenical organisation, I’ve spent plenty of time in other churches, including many at Romsey Abbey, the local CofE church.
The other day I was pondering this line used so often in CofE and Ecumenical services that I’ve attended:
“Lord, in Your mercy, hear our prayer”
Now there’s a song we learnt at church once that has this line in it.
“Grace is when God gives us the things we don’t deserve
Mercy is when God does not give us what we deserve”
And it made me think. When we ask God to hear our prayer, surely we’re asking for something we don’t deserve to happen, rather than for something we do deserve to not happen, so why is this common phrase not “Lord, in Your grace, hear our prayer”?
Another definition of Grace is:
God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense
And it’s through that that we have this relationship with the Father, this ability to talk to Him, to pray to Him, and so surely it is through Grace that we also would ask Him to hear our prayer?
I guess a lot of folk would say “In Jesus’ Name” at the end of their prayer, and that relates more to the Grace side of things…
I don’t know, this is just a collection of thoughts around the idea really!
What do you think?
