First Week. Thursday. Morning

O GOD! Thou art the Creator of all things: with Thee is the fountain of life. Thou didst make man at first in thine own image, and after thy likeness, to reflect thy glory in righteousness and true holiness. But, alas! how soon and how totally did he fall away from Thee! We humble ourselves before Thee as members of a fallen race. We with our fathers have sinned: we have done wickedly. Unto the Lord our God belongeth righteousness, but unto us shame and confusion of face, as at this day. We have not trusted Thee: we have not obeyed thy Word. The tempter has tempted us, and led us far astray. We have been drawn by the love of the world. We have sought the pleasures of sense. We have forgotten thy holy law. We have often put out the hand to forbidden things. We too have fallen by our iniquity. O Lord, convince us deeply of our sin, and work in us, by thy Holy Spirit, true repentance, which needeth not to be repented of, and a sincere faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

We adore thy manifold wisdom and the riches of thy grace in the promise which softened the fall of our first parents in Eden, and which, in its last fulfilment, will repeal the curse over all the earth. We thank thee for Him who came in the fulness of time, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. We thank Thee that he has finished the work given him to do. May we behold him coming to us now, travelling in the greatness of his strength, speaking in righteousness, and mighty to save. Teach us to admire his spotless life. Lift us up that we may behold his greatness and his beauty. Above all, bring us in penitent and humble trust to his cross, and help us to rely with unwavering confidence on that atoning sacrifice which he offered for us. Thus receiving Christ, and him crucified, as our salvation, may we walk in newness of life. Teach us to know the power of his resurrection. Give us the fellowship of his sufferings, and conform us increasingly unto his death. O Lord, graciously bend our will to thine: constrain our affections, and lift them up to spiritual things: cleanse our consciences from dead works: take all our nature into thy holy keeping, and let us be living sacrifices unto Thee.

Preserve us this day: guide all our steps: shield us from all evil: assist us in every duty. May all the days of our earthly pilgrimage, under thy gracious guidance, be leading us on to the heavenly rest; and may we all meet at length in our Father’s house above. We ask all in the name of our only Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Amen.