Lectionary readings (Click the links to see the readings): Micah 7.14-20 | Psalm 103.1-5 | Luke 15.1-3,11-32

Lord and maker of all things, from whose creative power the first light came forth, who looked upon the world's first morning and saw that it was good, praise you for this light that now streams through my windows to rouse me to the life of another day.

I praise you for the life that stirs within me:
I praise you for the bright and beautiful world into which I go:
I praise you for earth and sea and sky, for scudding cloud and singing bird:
I praise you for the work you have given me to do:
I praise you for all that you have given me to fill my leisure hours:
I praise you for my friends:
I praise you music and books and good company and all pure pleasures.

O you who are yourself everlasting mercy, give me a tender heart today towards all those to whom this morning light brings less joy than it brings to me:
those in whom the pulse of life grows weak:
those who must lie abed through all the sunny hours:
the blind, who are shut off from the light of day:
the overworked, who have no joy of leisure:
the unemployed who have no joy of labour:
the bereaved, whose hearts and homes are desolate,
and grant your mercy on them all.

O Light that never fades, as the light of day now streams through these windows and floods this room, so let me open to you the windows of my heart, that all my life may be filled by the radiance of your presence. Let no corner of my being be unillumined by the light of your countenance. Let there be nothing within me to darken the brightness of the day. Let the spirit of him whose life was the light of all people rule within my heart. Amen.

—John Baillie. A Diary of Private Prayer (Oxford, 1936)