This post was originally published here on Presbyterian Polity.
During its Thursday afternoon session, the 53rd General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America passed an overture from Philadelphia Presbytery (with corresponding overtures from Calvary and Fellowship Presbyteries) pertaining to the 250th Anniversary of the signing of the American Declaration of Independence. By this action, “the 53rd General Assembly encourages all congregations in the Presbyterian Church in America to give thanks to the Lord for the United States of America as we approach the 250th Anniversary of the Nation’s Founding.”
Following the Assembly’s adoption of the overture, Moderator Mel Duncan invited me to offer a prayer of thanksgiving for the United States of America. Brothers from several Presbyterian denominations descending from the colonial American Synod of New York and Philadelphia (including the PCA, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and Evangelical Presbyterian Church) subsequently asked me to share the text of the prayer, and I am happy to do so here. The text and video are below:
A Prayer of Thanksgiving for the United States of America
Heavenly Father, we praise You, our Creator and Keeper. Your mercies never fail, and they are new every morning. Great is Your faithfulness. You’ve ever and always been faithful, as revealed to us in, by, and through our Savior Jesus Christ: Prophet, Priest, and King of kings.
We give you thanks for Christ our King, and we do so in His Name. As a distant successor body of the Colonial American Synod of New York and Philadelphia, we thank You for hearing and answering the prayers of that Synod and its congregations, offered in solidarity with pious Christians “of probity and principle of every profession,” united under Christ’s banner of love. In this 250th anniversary year of the signing of the American Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, we thank You for the United States of America and the “state of liberty” which You, our covenant-keeping God, have graciously established and preserved in this land. “Surely His salvation is near to those who fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land” (Psalm 85:9).
Lord our God, we earnestly renew the entreaty: “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10). We pray that You would advance the sacred cause of liberty here at home in North America and abroad around the world such that we Your Church might freely worship You according to Your Word. We pray that You would establish justice and righteousness in these United States through the equal protection of every human life under the law, and the punishment of evildoers (WCF 23.1). We pray this for the glory of Christ, the Head of the Church, that by His Word and Spirit, all nations would recognize His supreme beauty, power, goodness, grace, and love.
May God bless the PCA, may God bless America, and may God bless our pilgrimage, in the glorious Name of Christ we pray, Amen.
