Noon Hymn

Creator of the earth and skies, to whom the words of life belong, grant us your truth to make us wise; grant us your power to make us strong.

We have not known you: to the skies our monuments of folly soar, and all our self-wrought miseries have made us trust ourselves the more.

We have not loved you: far and wide, the wreckage of our hatred spreads, and evils wrought by human pride recoil on unrepentant heads.

For this, our foolish confidence, our price of knowledge and of sin, we come to you in penitence; in our the work of grace begin.

Teach us to know and love you, Lord, and humbly follow in your way. Speak to our souls the quickening word, and turn our darkness into day.

(Hymnal 1982, #148)