Prayer of Repentance

In Jewish history there were great public prayers of repentance. One was given by Nehemiah beginning in the ninth Chapter of Nehemiah. Later there would be other great public prayers including the one by Solomon when he dedicated the temple.

Sometimes we ask how the Jews could have forgotten God and done evil after God had worked with them so openly and obviously.

My belief is that we owe the Jews a great apology. We who claim to have the truth in Jesus Christ, the living and breathing Word of God, seem to have found ways to out do the falling away that we find from time to time in Jewish history.

Jesus once said in Luke 10:12 the following:

"Woe to you Chroazin, woe to you Bethsaida! For if the miracles had been performed in Tyre and Sidon which occured in you, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the judgment than for you. And for you Capernaum, you will not be exalted to heaven, will you? You will be brought down to Hades!"

In short, we Christians have far out done the Jews in the business of falling away.

Below is a rough draft of a Prayer of Repentance if we had a modern Christian Nehemiah asking God to restore the Church just as Nehemiah worked to restore the house of God.

PRAYER OF REPENTANCE

God forgive us for our sins
For we have sinned much

You have said that the world would know you exist
By our love one for another
We have sinned against your unity
We have fought with one another
We have set up denominations
And erected fences against our brothers and sisters
Fences of race and denominationalism.

You have said that they will know we are Christians by our love
But we have not loved
And many have been lost to your kingdom
Through our failure to love and our selfishness

We have honored the rich brethren
We have given them special seats in our assemblies
We have ignored the poor and the unfortunate
We have taught that the rich are blessed of God
And that the poor are poor because of their negative confessions-
But Jesus said “Blessed are the poor for they shall see God.”

Our leaders have brought the name of Christ into disrepute
Through their sexual promiscuity
They have taken advantage of Your sheep
For their personal pleasures
We have gone so far as to deny that
There is any sexual right or wrong
We have permitted practicing homosexuality
Even in the ministry.
Our ministers while proclaiming chastity
Have taken advantage of our own children.
We are as bad as Sodom and Gomorrah
But to their sins we add hypocrisy as well.

We have encouraged the poor to give until it hurts
So that our leaders may personally profit
We have built beautiful places of worship
On the backs of the poor and suffering
All the time forgetting our obligations
To go preaching the gospel through out the world.

We have exalted the fruits of materiality
Over the fruits of spirituality


We esteem the rich and hate the poor.

We say that You are welcome in worship
But if Your Spirit visits us, we quench the Spirit
Our services belong to us not to You
They are under our control not Yours.

We claim to worship you
But we stand with hands lowered and voices lowered even further.
We are dumb before you
We are ashamed to sing your praises.

Instead of dancing before you with joy
We play the part of David’s wife
And disdain any joy shown in worshipping You

Our sense of decorum outweighs our sense of love.
We prefer ritual to reality.
We love predictability over spontaneity.
We have sacrificed our spiritual creativity
On the altars of convenience.

Our repentance is cold
Our hearts are colder
Our prayer is flat and uninspired
Forgive us O Lord.
Break our hearts
Give us compassion
Help us to pray with tears again
Forgive us for our coldness and lack of love.

Instead of taking care of our brothers
We have passed on the other side of the road
And looked away.

When You were sick we did not visit You or pray for You
When You were in prison we did not visit You
When You were naked we did not clothe You
When You were hungry and thirsty
We did not feed You or give You anything to drink.

Our history is replete with crusades and inquisitions
But we have not shown love and tolerance.

Due to our lack of love and unity we have seen societal decay.
Our society still allows the sacrifice of children in the fire to Moloch
Through permitting abortion.
We live in a flood of immorality and pornography
We exalt violence and sexual promiscuity
Though all forms of media, including books, movies, music and the internet.
Leading even to incest and victimization of children.
We have removed God from our school system
And replaced You with the gods of the market place and pseudo science

Due to our coldness and lack of love
Alternative religions flourish including witchcraft, fortunetelling,
Palmistry and other occult practices.
There is New Age, Spitualism and new false
Religions on every street corner.

Our world has been filled with drugs
That enslave man and take his or her freewill.
It has turned family member against family member
And even caused family members to victimize one another.
Our world has overflowed with violence
And hatred. There is truly a spirit of lawlessness.

Poverty, illness, materialism, and false religion
Divide up our world into kingdoms
Each kingdom being held in dictatorial sway.

We have thrown out God from our court system
And yet wonder why there is no justice.
We have refused to take your commands seriously.
We have replaced the 10 Commandments and the Two Great Commandments
With volumes of commands and laws that no one can keep.

We exalt human reasoning over God’s commands.

We have lost our evangelistic zeal
We are instructed now by believers in poorer countries
Regarding righteousness and the word of God.

Instead of worshipping at your altar
Our altar has become our television sets
We are more interested in the news
Than in the commands of God
We are more interested in sports
Than in the game of life
And the serious contest
Between good and evil.


God have mercy upon us,
God restore us to Yourself
We pray that You would once again lead Your people
Wipe out our sins again with Your blood .
Give us a heart for You
Help us to love You and follow You.

Forgive us for our great sins
And have mercy upon us.

Amen.