Epiphany 5

Lord and Holy One,

You gave complete worship in Israel. No detail was neglected, from the holy manifestation of its object to the solemnity of its style to the atonement of its practitioners to the finance of its ministers. And yet something was missing which only the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of your well beloved son could give.

You who does not require sacrifice but righteous and tender hearts, you who desires us to call upon you in the splendor of holiness are not a bloodthirsty God. Rather you choose to participate in our flesh and blood, that we may shed no more our own. Let us hear today what the Spirit declares: all that is the Son’s whom the Father has given him. Let us find full atonement by the blood of the Son, and worship by Spirit and truth. Turn our sorrow at the foot of the cross to full joy and consolation that the ruler of the world is judged, and none shall again accuse us, as we worship you in the heaven of heavens unto ages everlasting.