The traditional Christian church calendar is comprised of seasons. We have reached the season of Lent. Lent is a forty-day period, not including Sundays, for contemplation, reflection, and making amends for past actions. We are given the freedom of choice and should consider why we make poor choices.
Brief Order For Confession and Forgiveness
Music to accompany this worship is on Spotify at:
Entrance Hymn
My Song is Love Unknown
Kyrie
Hymn of Praise
Prayer of the Day
O God, with steadfast love you draw us to yourself, and in mercy you receive our prayers. Strengthen us to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, that through life and death we may live in your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
The First Lesson
Jeremiah 31:31-34
31 The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord.
33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
34 No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.
Psalm
Psalm 51:1-12 (10)
1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless when you pass judgment.
5 Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me.
6 You desire truth in the inward being; therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.
The Second Lesson
Hebrews 5:5-10
5 So also Christ did not glorify himself in becoming a high priest, but was appointed by the one who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”;
6 as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.”
7 In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.
8 Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered;
9 and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him,
10 having been designated by God a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
The Gospel Acclamation
Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains a | single grain;*
but if it dies, it | bears much fruit. (John 12:24)
The Gospel
John 12:20-33
12 The next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem.
13 So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord— the King of Israel!”
14 Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it; as it is written:
15 “Do not be afraid, daughter of Zion. Look, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!”
16 His disciples did not understand these things at first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written of him and had been done to him.
17 So the crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to testify.
18 It was also because they heard that he had performed this sign that the crowd went to meet him.
19 The Pharisees then said to one another, “You see, you can do nothing. Look, the world has gone after him!”
20 Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks.
21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.”
22 Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.
23 Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.
25 Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
26 Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.
27 “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—”Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.
28 Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”
29 The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.”
30 Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not for mine.
31 Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out.
32 And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”
33 He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.
The Sermon
The closer we are to another the more we feel their joy and their pain.
The Hymn of the Day
Glory be to Jesus
The Creed
The Peace
Salaam Aleikum
The Prayers
The Offering
Communion
The Lord’s Prayer
Communion Hymns
Christ, the Life of All the Living
Communal Blessing
Dismissal
The Bible readings are from the New Revised Standard Version. I wish to thank the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, ELCA, and its predecessor bodies for all their teaching throughout the years. I’ve used the Lectionary published on the ELCA website at elca.org in preparation of this worship.