A Prayer for Monday

Our Father, the week begins and we ask that it begin with you. We confess that we are slaves of the one we obey, and we thank you that you have transferred us from the service of sin to the service of righteousness. We did not free ourselves. You set us free.

Keep us this week from the foolishness of thinking we can serve no one. When the self asks for our allegiance, remind us what it has paid us in the past and where its road leads. Let us not reap again the things we are now ashamed of.

Give us obedience from the heart, not obedience for show. Let the pattern of teaching that claimed us go on shaping us, in our work, in our homes, and in the private places no one else sees.

We remember that the wages of sin is death but that your gift is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Let us live today as people who have received the gift and stopped working for the wages. Amen.