Lectionary readings (Click the links to see the readings):
Isaiah 49.1-17 | Psalm 71.1-14 | 1 Corinthians 1.18-31 | John 12.20-36

Confession

Oh Lord, I come to you out of my great need. You have pledged your word that whosoever comes to you shall in no wise be cast out.

I dare to pray that something will happen to me in your presence. Lord, I know that I need to be changed! For the visions that once swept across the leaden skies of monotony, like white-winged gulls, have dimmed and faded, and I would see them again. Open my eyes!

Shame fills my heart as I remember the aspirations that I have breathed before you, the vows I made, the resolves that were born, the seedlings of consecration that were planted in my heart. I blush to remember the withering blight that touched them all—my failures, my shortcomings.

I confess before you that:
I have had longings and nudges from you which I did not translate into action.
I have made decisions without consulting you, then have blamed you when things went wrong.
I have said that I trusted you, yet have not turned my affairs over to you.
I have been greedy for present delights and pleasures, unwilling to wait for those joys which time and discipline alone can give.
I have often sought the easy way, have consistently drawn back from the road that is hard.
I have been fond of giving myself to dreams of what I am going to do sometime, yet have been so slow in getting started to do them.

Forgive me for all the intentions that were born and somehow never lived. These, Lord Jesus, are sins, grievous in your site and grievous even in mine.

And now I claim your promise to change me. Do for me what I cannot do for myself. Lead me into a new tomorrow with a new spirit. Cleanse my heart, create within me new attitudes and new ideas, and as only you can create them.

For these good gifts, I thank you, Lord.

—The Prayers of Peter Marshall, edited by Catherine Marshall. London: Peter Davies, 1955.

Pilate washes his hands.

J.S. Bach. Durch dein Gefängnis, Gottes Sohn [Through this thy prison, Son of God]; chorale no. 7 from the St. John Passion (BWV 245, 1724). The Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists, dir. John Eliot Gardiner.