As the church calendar rolls on each year, Collects come and go. We hear them prayed out loud, usually on Sunday mornings. Some of us might also see the texts in our bulletins, but there is little opportunity to reflect on and appreciate what is being prayed because, just as the calendar rolls on, so does the liturgy, and we won’t hear that collect again for another year, or even longer in The Book of Alternative Service’s (BAS) three year cycle of propers in Lent, for example.
Unless we are praying the daily offices, that is, which would cause us to repeat Sunday’s Collect every day for the rest of the week (except for special times like Holy Week when there is a special Collect for each day).
Not that I’m complaining. Liturgy literally means “the work of the people.” Therefore it’s not something that is done to or for us. There is some personal effort required. It is something we all are called to “do” by God’s grace, through Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Before we proceed, a note about the word “Collect” as a liturgical prayer. As in its regular English usage, it has the sense of gathering together, as in gathering the faithful in worship and as a collective prayer that gathers all our prayers into a particular focus for the day and season in the church year. Archbishop Thomas Cranmer developed the form and pattern for us Anglicans. (You can find more information here: https://seedbed.com/the-anatomy-of-a-prayer-using-the-collect-in-worship/ and https://anglicancompass.com/the-collects/).
The Collects for the First Sunday in Lent in both prayer books give us an excellent spiritual guide:
O LORD, who for our sake didst fast forty days and forty nights: Give us grace to use such abstinence, that, our flesh being subdued to the Spirit, we may ever obey thy godly motions in righteousness and true holiness, to thy honour and glory; who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen. (BCP, p140)
Almighty God, whose Son fasted forty days in the wilderness, and was tempted as we are but did not sin, give us grace to discipline ourselves in submission to your Spirit, that as you know our weakness, so we may know your power to save; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. (BAS, p286)
God’s grace working in us as we — in a suitably disciplined manner — observe a holy and abstemious Lent by self-examination, penitence (repentance), prayer (the daily offices in those very same prayer books, perhaps?), fasting, almsgiving (self-denial), reading and meditating on the Word of God (BCP, p612, BAS, p282) — all while subdued and in submission to the Holy Spirit — would result in at least some growth in righteousness, true holiness and getting to know and enjoy God’s power to save, don’t you think?
I’ve collected all the additional blessings and growth that would be ours if The LORD were to grant the petitions in the rest of the Lenten collects should we pray them earnestly! Added to the aforementioned righteousness, true holiness etc., we would also be:
1) Defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul (BCP, p143)
2) Strengthened by his grace and changed into his likeness, from glory to glory (BAS, p288)
3) Defended against all our enemies (BCP, p145)
4) Strengthened to follow Christ, our pattern and our hope (BAS, p290)
5) Mercifully relieved of the consequences of our evil deeds, by the comfort of God’s grace. (BCP, p147
6) Given the true bread whereby Jesus would more truly live in us, and we in him (BAS, p292)
7) Governed and preserved evermore, both in body and soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, p148)
8) Transformed by the power of his victorious cross (BAS, p295)
Defended, strengthened, relieved, comforted, governed and preserved in Jesus. Fruit of a holy Lent subdued and submitted to the Holy Spirit. What a blessed spiritual state in which to celebrate and enjoy Easter this, or any other, year!
