Thank you for joining us for Holy Week Prayer. The guide below indicates in bold type where all of us read together; the normal type is said by a single voice, and the italic type indicate instructions or references, not read aloud. A colon (:) indicates a pause.
​A PDF version of the week's prayers is found here >>

Holy Saturday
 
O Lord, let my soul rise up to meet you
As the day rises to meet the sun.

Glory to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit
As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.
 
Come, let us bow down and bend the knee : let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.
 
Silence
 
Listen, Lord, to the cries of your poor: break hell’s hold, fling wide heaven’s door.
 
Psalm 31:1-5
In you, O Lord, have I taken refuge; let me never be put to shame : deliver me in your righteousness.
Incline your ear to me : make haste to deliver me.
Be my strong rock, a castle to keep me safe, for you are my crag and my stronghold, for the sake of your name, lead me and guide me.
Take me out of the net that they have secretly set for me : for you are my tower of strength.
Into your hands I commend my spirit : for you have redeemed me, O Lord, O God of truth.
 
Listen, Lord, to the cries of your poor: break hell’s hold, fling wide heaven’s door.
 
Old Testament reading | Job 14:1-14
1 “Mortals, born of woman,
    are of few days and full of trouble.
2 They spring up like flowers and wither away;
    like fleeting shadows, they do not endure.
3 Do you fix your eye on them?
    Will you bring them before you for judgment?
4 Who can bring what is pure from the impure?
    No one!
5 A person’s days are determined;
    you have decreed the number of his months
    and have set limits he cannot exceed.
6 So look away from him and let him alone,
    till he has put in his time like a hired laborer.
7 “At least there is hope for a tree:
    If it is cut down, it will sprout again,
    and its new shoots will not fail.
8 Its roots may grow old in the ground
    and its stump die in the soil,
9 yet at the scent of water it will bud
    and put forth shoots like a plant.
10 But a man dies and is laid low;
    he breathes his last and is no more.
11 As the water of a lake dries up
    or a riverbed becomes parched and dry,
12 so he lies down and does not rise;
    till the heavens are no more, people will not awake
    or be roused from their sleep.
13 “If only you would hide me in the grave
    and conceal me till your anger has passed!
If only you would set me a time
    and then remember me!
14 If someone dies, will they live again?
    All the days of my hard service
    I will wait for my renewal to come.
 
New Testament Gospel reading | John 19:38-42
38 Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. 39 He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds.
40 Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. 41 At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had ever been laid. 42 Because it was the Jewish day of Preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.
 
Listen, Lord, to the cries of your poor: break hell’s hold, fling wide heaven’s door.
 
These words are from an ancient homily for Holy Saturday: “Something strange is happening – there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear. He has gone to search for our first parents, as for lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sign of him, Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: ‘My Lord be with you all.’ Christ answered him: ‘And with your spirit.’ He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying, ‘Awake O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.’ “
 
Prayers for others
 
Our Father (Lord's Prayer)
 
As you hovered over the darkness that covered the earth at the beginning of time, may your Spirit move among us in the silence of this day, preparing for a new life. Amen.
 
May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you  :
Wherever he may send you :
May he guide you through the wilderness :
Protect you through the storm :
May he bring you home rejoicing :
At the wonders he has shown you :
May he bring you home rejoicing :
Once again into our doors.
 

This liturgy is taken from the book, Common Prayer A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals, by Shane Claiborne, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, and Enuma Okoro, published by Zondervan, copyright 2010 by The Simple Way and School for Conversion.