The Great Thanksgiving For Lent 3A

The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
God of the Wilderness, it is with thankful hearts that we praise for in all your love and Glory - that you are ever reaching out to us - even in the Wilderness of our hearts.

After Jesus’s baptism, he went into the wilderness to prepare for his ministry and to learn better Who he was, the Son of Man, God incarnate. God enfleshed, living as we live.

We too are in the wilderness in our Lenten journey, too prone to isolating ourselves, too prone to thinking we can do this alone. Save us from ourselves - may we find surprising connection and companionship in you, each other, and our neighbors. Help us experience you in the Wilderness, experience Jesus in our lives.

On his last night with his disciples before his crucifixion, Jesus gathered to eat with his friends. And on that night before Jesus died, when he was gathered together with his disciples, he took bread, gave thanks to you, broke the bread, gave it to his disciples and said:

"Take, eat, this is my body which is given for you,
do this in remembrance of me."

When the supper was over, he took the cup, blessed it, gave it to his disciples and said:

"Drink from this, all of you. This is my blood of the New Covenant,
poured out for you and for many, for the forgiveness of sins.
Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me."

It is in awe and wonder, praise and thanksgiving that we offer ourselves up as a holy and living sacrifice, in union with Christ’s sacrifice for us as we proclaim the mystery of faith:

Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again.
Holy, Loving God, pour out your Spirit on us gathered here
And on these gifts of bread and juice.
Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ
That we may be for the world the body of Christ, redeemed and reconciling.

Through your Son Jesus Christ,
With the Holy Spirit in your holy church,
All honor and glory is yours, Almighty God,
Now and forever, Amen.