SEVENTH WEEK.—THURSDAY. — Evening

O LORD, our God, bless, we pray Thee, thy Word to our souls, and enable us to follow its teachings. Grant that it may be our constant aim to do as well as know thy will. Put thy laws in our minds, and write them in our hearts, that we may be thy people, and that thou mayest be our God.

Make us, we beseech Thee, pure and holy; create within us clean hearts, and renew right spirits within us. Sanctify our affections and desires, that it may be our joy to obey thy commandments and glorify thy name, and make us fruitful in all good works, to the glory of thy name. May our conduct ever prove that we are indeed the disciples of Christ. Give us grace to walk in his footsteps, and to look to him as our example, as well as our Saviour. May the same mind that was in Jesus be in us. May we cultivate his temper and disposition, and beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, be changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

Guide us, O God, we pray Thee, by thy Holy Spirit, into all truth. Forbid that we should be blind followers of the blind. Give unto us both light and sight. Open our eyes, that we may behold wondrous things out of thy law, and enable us to walk in the light, as children of light. Reveal unto us, we earnestly entreat Thee, the glory of the Saviour’s character and work. Give unto us firm faith in the efficacy of his sacrifice, and the completeness of his atonement. Make us to realise the power of his blood to wash away all sin, to cleanse the soul from all pollution, and to render us perfectly acceptable to Thee. Forgive, we pray Thee, for his sake, all the sins that we have this day committed. Speak to us words of pardon and peace. Cause us to know that our sins are forgiven, and thus inspire us with full confidence in thy fatherly goodness, and child-like, loving trust in thy protection and care.

Accept our hearty thanks for all the mercies of this day—for health, food, and raiment; for the pleasures of friendship, for family endearments, for all the good we enjoy. Make each individual member of this household the object of thy love, and the partaker of thy grace, and bless all the inhabitants of the earth with the joys of thy salvation.

Watch over us during the hours of darkness; preserve us from all harm; refresh us with the sleep Thou givest to thy beloved, and raise us up on the morrow invigorated and refreshed for its duties. Guide us by thy counsel, and afterwards receive us to glory, for the sake of thy dear Son; and unto God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, as unto one God, we will render everlasting praise. Amen.