The story from Genesis 22

Our ancestor Abraham answered when God called to him and tried to live faithful
to the covenant God made with him. But there came a day when Abraham
believed that God required a grievous sacrifice of him—his only beloved son,
Isaac. When Abraham travelled to the lonely, barren place to fulfill what he
thought God demanded, God stayed his hand; God provided a ram for the
holocaust offering. Abraham trusted in the inheritance God had promised, and in
the goodness of the God he followed. And God restored his beloved son, Isaac to
him, his grandchildren and great-grandchildren and all the family that would
follow down the years.

ALL: O God, my life is safe in your hands.

The story from Exodus 14

When our ancestors were slaves in Egypt, God liberated us. When our oppressors
pursued us with engines of war and terror, with chariots and charioteers, we
feared death was upon us and cried out. But the mighty presence of God
MOVED. At the edge of the sea, with death before us and behind us, God drove
the wind and the waters. God’s saving arm held the waters back and caused the
sea to yield. God made a passage for us that we might walk safely through the
darkest night.

ALL: O God, my life is safe in your hands.

The story from Isaiah 54

There were times from the beginning when we were a hard-hearted and a hard-
headed people. Always God called us back. With great tenderness, God took us
back. Though mountains fall and hills shake, God’s love will never leave us. We
have seen the promise of God’s kingdom, what lies beyond our selfishness and
fear: everlasting peace and justice mightier than any oppression.

ALL: O God, my life is safe in your hands.

The story from Baruch 6

Even when we had been carried off again, enslaved and driven from our homes,
made to live as strangers in a strange land, God dwelt with us and gave us
wisdom. God showed us the wonder of the stars and galaxies shining in the
heavens, the heavens that God had made. God walked with us and lighted our
way, helped us understand where there was fullness of life.

ALL: Lord, you have the words of everlasting life.

The story from Ezekiel 36

Still the blood we spilled cried out from the earth, and the violence we did to
God’s creation profaned it. We were unfaithful and false and cruel. Our hearts
had turned to stone.
Then God made new hearts, tender hearts, hearts that could break again, and
breathed new life into them, God’s life, and placed them into us. God said again,
“You are my beloved; I am your God.”

ALL: O God, create in me a clean heart; put into me a new and steadfast spirit.
Do not banish me from your presence, do not deprive me of your spirit.

The Word of God as recorded in the books of Genesis, Exodus, Isaiah, Baruch, and Ezekiel.