Father, You have established Jesus Christ as both Lord and Christ, and Your Word tells us that the first generation of those who heard the gospel were cut the heart by this message, by this declaration. Father, our nation is not cut to the heart, and so we pray that You would grant a spirit of confession to our people, and that You would use our worship now as a means of exalting Jesus as both Lord and Christ . . . such that our nation hears and turns back to You.
We know, Father, that if we in the Church regard iniquity in our own midst, or in our own hearts, this prayer will be ineffectual.
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And so we confess to You that our worship of You has not exalted Christ as it ought to have done. We pray that Your Spirit would correct this deficiency in us, and that You would forgive all our sins related to it. We confess this to You now.
Father, we confess our individual sins to You now—and Selah . . . We do this in the great name of Jesus, and amen.
Christ has been exalted, and He has been exalted to the place where He can give the gift of repentance. He has done this for you now—as you have indeed repented. As a minister of this grace, I declare to you that your sins are forgiven through Christ.
Congregation: Thanks be to God!