Our Father and God, You have established Your Church as a royal priesthood in this world, and so we intercede for the nations of men now, confessing on their behalf so that the grace of Your forgiveness will soon be extended to them all.
Father, we are tired of living in the drought of summer. We pray that our people will tire of trying to live apart from You, and we pray that You would increase our sense of that drought until we all, as one man, cry out for the living water that only You can supply. Father, those who don’t know You need to be brought to the point where they confess that they don’t. And so we confess this on their behalf.
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
. So Father, we confess that we in the Church have not known You as we ought to have done. We have been given the gift of living water, but have not been eager to drink of it the way we should have done. Forgive us for not receiving from You.
Father, we confess individual or private sins to You now—and Selah . . . We do this in the strong name of our Lord and Savior, the Lord Jesus, and amen.
One of the best experiences in the world is to be given a drink of cold water when You are parched. Forgiveness of sin is like that. And now that you have confessed your sin, and on the basis of every scriptural promise of cleansing, as a minister of those promises, I declare to you that your sins are forgiven through Christ.
Congregation: Thanks be to God!