Audience: business or civic group
Message: Bless the family of this individual and the ongoing contributions of the deceased’s memory.
Tone: formal
Timing: 1 minute

Dear Lord, (name) has been Your faithful servant on earth for many years. She has served long and well. As we as friends and business associates have gathered to remember her contributions to our lives, we ask that You particularly be near her family.

Rather than lessen the pain of the loss of a loved one, the years seem only to heighten our appreciation of that great loss. Specifically, we ask Your guidance for her son and daughter as they settle matters of (name)’s concern. Those of us who know her children well know that their adult lives have already produced gain in the world. Much of that, we know, is a direct influence from their mother’s life.

And then as business associates, we realize that many of our successes on the job are a result of (name)’s direction, advice, and knowledge.

Together we are thankful for her contribution and example before us. Those of us who didn’t get an opportunity to express our appreciation to her directly ask particularly that Your spirit grant her that knowledge in the afterlife.

Even now, her compassion in word and deed continues to glow within us. As she has honored us with her life, we ask that You help us honor her and her family today.

Thank You for Your eternal provisions for us all.

Audience: business or civic group
Message: Bless the ongoing contributions of the deceased’s memory.
Tone: formal
Timing: 1 minute

Please bow your heads as we each in our own way remember (name). This memory, of course, Lord, will not be our last. We acknowledge Your right and power both to give life and to take it.

We accept Your will in our lives, even when it may bring us heartache and even when we may not understand the reasons.

We ask that You as an all-compassionate God help us to carry on (name)’s work that we have gathered here to commemorate. As we have talked about and remembered his contributions to the community, family, and friends, we ask that you inspire us to do our part in seeing his efforts come to a successful reality.

Particularly, we ask Your blessings on (name of favorite project) that he loved and worked with.

Help those individuals who benefited from his efforts there continue in their progress to regain hope and stability for their lives. Help those in leadership to bring others into the causes for which (name) worked so diligently.

We trust confidently that today (name)’s spirit is at rest with You, his Maker. And we thank You that his example and memory is still among us, his friends.

Audience: business or civic group
Message: Bless us as individuals as we grow in our professional and personal lives.
Tone: formal
Timing: 1 minute

Our Heavenly Father, bless this food that we have enjoyed tonight and its nourishment for our continued strength and health. We also ask that You bless all those who have so capably handled the details of this event to make the evening profitable and meaningful for all of us.

Thank You for the ideas and insights that have been shared. Help us to use them to grow as business professionals and as family members. Enrich our lives because of our attendance and contributions among this group of friends and associates.

We thank You for Your provisions and Your ongoing protection. Keep us mindful that we are in Your service while on this earth.

Audience: civic group
Message: Bless us as we solve problem issues.
Tone: formal
Timing: 1 minute

Dear Lord, we ask Your presence and blessings on our time together tonight. We have come to express our concerns about the welfare of our community…. To learn from each other…. To grow in spirit and in character…. To find Your will for our lives and neighborhoods.

We thank You for the opportunity in this country to assemble ourselves at any time and at any place to discuss our concerns as citizens. We are mindful that many in our world do not enjoy such freedom.

Grant us the wisdom to carry out decisions within Your will. Bless us as we continue to conduct our business with dignity and sensitivity.

Audience: business or civic associates
Message: Bless this individual as she continues to contribute.
Tone: formal
Timing: 1 minute

At the closing of these shared thoughts about our friend and colleague, we are reminded once again about how time slips by. How days slip into months and years of career and achievement.

We thank You, Lord, for the privilege of working with (name) through the years. For her example of enthusiasm, integrity, dedication, and compassion. As we continue to work at our individual tasks, thank You for the way she has contributed to our professional and personal growth.

We also ask Your special blessings on (name). In her retirement years, grant her rest, peace, and pride in her career accomplishments. We ask that You also continue to give her good health and many years to continue her personal contributions to the lives of friends and family. Bless her as she serves in whatever way You lead.

Audience: business and civic associates
Message: Bless us in this achievement.
Tone: formal
Timing: 2 minutes

As we are gathered here today to present these scholarship funds to (name) University, we seek Your blessings on our efforts and intentions.

We are mindful this money collected throughout the nation from friends and alumni of the organization is but a token of the love we hold for learning. As paper, the money is nothing. But at work in the lives of young people, we know it means a future for the individuals involved and a contribution to society and all of us.

To those scholarship recipients, the money will bring hard work, respect for authority, appreciation of knowledge, development of skills, and a manner of livelihood. For society, these scholarships represent a quest for more knowledge, a desire for the cures to the diseases that afflict us, a prevention of economic and industrial evils that plague us, a hope for a better life for generations to come.

Thank You for the blessings on us individually and collectively—blessings that have allowed us to work and see the financial rewards of that work.

Thank You that our resources are enough to meet our own needs and to share.

Thank You for giving contributors a charitable spirit and foresight about this need.

Thank You for giving leadership in this academic community to oversee the uses of this money.

And finally, thank You for the dedication and determination of those young people who will achieve because of these scholarships.

Bless us together.