The World Development Committee - Whose Earth?

Whose Earth?

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Liturgical Resources: What a Wonderful World!

Call to Worship

Leader:	The earth belongs to God, the world and all its people.
All:	All power belongs to God who reigns above all nations.
Leader:	In Jesus God revealed that all life is sacred.
	God's Spirit knows no bounds in making all things new.

Prayer of Thanksgiving and Adoration

Loving God of creation, restoration and renewal, as we gather in your presence, help and guide us by your Holy Spirit so that we may have real fellowship with you and each other, and worship you in spirit and in truth as good stewards of this good earth.

We come together as a company of your people with praise and thanksgiving for the wonder and bounty of the earth on which we dwell. We thank and praise you for imposing mountains and rolling hills, rich forests and productive fields, fresh water and teeming seas, and the boggling variety of natural life.

With the changing seasons and their offerings you supply our human needs and you are the same yesterday, today and forever in your love and care for us, and in your concern for this universe, which you made well.

We thank you for all the good gifts of creation and remember our first calling and deep responsibility to care for your world, to have husbandry over the works of your hand and to replenish the earth and attend to its needs. Guide us and strengthen us, we pray, to live worthily as part of your created order in gratitude for all that you do to sustain and nurture us on the journey of shaping all that is to your good will of abundance, justice and peace.

As we journey towards the great banquet of rich food for all peoples, when death will be swallowed up for ever and the tears wiped away from all faces, hear us as we pray together as the Lord of the banquet taught us, saying, "Our Father... "

Prayer of Confession

Lord God of gracious abundance and healing goodness, thank you for the seasons of the year, each with its own beauty and promise.

As we celebrate your creation, we celebrate you, our creator. We thank you even from our erring hearts for the rich variety and vibrancy of all you have made.

Heavenly Father, forgive us for our failure to appreciate and our capacity to destroy. Forgive us for what we have done and continue to do to your world.

You gave us beauty, peace, harmony and love, but we have replaced these with greed, violence, hatred and conflict. We selfishly destroy so much that is good, fail to care for each other's needs and rob tomorrow's children of their future.

Forgive us, Lord; we are so twisted and turned in on ourselves. Yet we are now beginning to see the consequence of our sin, not only on a personal but also on a global scale.

Help us to see what we can do to right the wrong, heal the hurt, knit together the torn web of life and work to save what you made well.

Prayer of Intercession

Lord we thank you for providing for us all growing things; the beauty and variety of land, sea and sky. We thank you for coming as one of us, showing how closely you hold us in your love; dying and rising that we might choose to live.

Lord we thank you that you have called us to love as you do, when you told us that in as much as we do it unto one of the least of these, we do it unto you.

Lord we pray for those in the western mountains of Honduras whose soil, stripped bare of trees, has been washed away, sometimes in landslides. Where there were mighty forests and running water, now there is the threat of a ruined landscape. We ask your blessing on villagers meeting together with our Christian Aid and Tearfund partners to seek a better future through composting and planting organic gardens to feed their families.

We pray for our Christian Aid and Tearfund partners as they come alongside communities to help in protecting remaining forest, and to plant new trees as a way of maintaining soil fertility and regular rainfall.

We thank you for the dignity of people being able to work to feed their own families, even as they work to build communities secure in their ability to meet the needs of people into the future.

Lord we remember those in Honduras, as they teach one another new and better ways of farming and abandon the old slash and burn method. We pray for security of land tenure to encourage long-term thinking, and planning, and planting.

Lord help us to change our damaging and profligate ways so that all may share the benefits of this earth, living in dignity and peace.

Charge and Benediction

Go out into the world to learn from the birds of the air and the lilies of the field... God's wisdom for right living embedded in the order of creation...

And:

The God of creative energy
The Jesus in whom all things hold together and find their true purpose
And the Holy Spirit who heals and makes all things new
Be with you as you go.

An the people of God say, "Amen."