Hope That Renews the Present

ALMIGHTY! we give Thee thanks that we can declare with Thy servant of old that “Our hope is in Thee.” Thou hast led us these many years, but too often we have forgotten the hand that guided us, and now we beseech Thee to have mercy on us.

If Thou shouldest count up our sins, who could stand before Thee? May Thy continual mercy lead us to hope in Thy love. When we are weary of ourselves, help us to have patience, remembering that Thou art patient with us. Let the past have no power to blight the present. O Lord, if forty years in the wilderness do discourage us, and we doubt if ever our foot shall tread the Holy Land, let us remember Thy patience, so that we may not be tempted to throw down the burden.

Hold us up even to the end, and may the last song from our dying lips be, “In Thee will I hope.” Grant us this perpetual rest in Thee. There is no shifting, no shadow of change for those whose hope is stayed on God. Be a true Father to us. Carry not our errors into the world to come; correct them now. Look upon those to whom life is all freshness, brightness, and beauty. Grant that the true beauty of life may be theirs. Look upon those whose footsteps, daily growing slower, are fast passing out of life; in quietness and in trust may they bide Thy time.

Wherein we have broken the sweet law of charity, forgive us, and for the time to come make us never weary in righteousness. Hear our prayers, comfort us on every hand, and at last receive us into the company of the blessed.—AMEN.