For Your Spirit, Holy John
Oh for your spirit, holy John to cleanse us
from all contentious and unholy speaking
that with lips chastened we may sing more fitly
your wondrous story
There by the altar at the hour of incence
God's great archangel came to Zechariah
your birth foretelling, and your name and calling
as Christ's forerunner.
Oh, may the power of your intercession,
all stony hardness from our heart expelling,
smooth the rough places and the crooked straighten
here in the desert.
Thus may our gracious Maker and Redeemer,
seeking a station for his hallowed footsteps,
find, when he comes here, temples unpolluted,
fit to receive him.
Praise to the Father, to the Sole-begotten,
and to the Spirit, with them both co-equal;
so we adore you, one and only Godhead,
through all the ages. Amen.
