May 17, 2020 Worship Service

brandonredeemer

May 16, 20208 min read

6th Sunday of Easter Worship Service

I will launch this service at around 9:30 a.m.

These Services will be provided by Zoom again. The Zoom password that you will need if asked: 762034

We will be holding Sunday Church Services this way until further notice.

Thank you,

Jeremy Grasby

EASTER 6, May 17, 2020, Redeemer Lutheran ZOOM worship

P=Pastor L=Leader C=Congregation

Greeting

P. The grace of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the love of God, and

the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

C. And also with you.

Invocation

* Doing the loving thing is not always easy.

The first disciples struggled with it. So do we.

But even when it is difficult, we remember Jesus’ undying love for us.

Christ is risen!

Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Hymn - ELW 389 Christ is Alive; Let Christians Sing

(Hymn lyrics printed under OneLicence # 11411292)

1. Christ is alive! Let Christians sing. The cross stands empty to the sky.

Let streets and homes with praises ring. Love, drowned in death, shall never die.

2. Christ is alive! No longer bound to distant years in Palestine,

but saving, healing, here and now, and touching every place and time.

3. In ev’ry insult, rift and war, where colour, scorn or wealth divide,

Christ suffers still, yet loves the more, and lives, where even hope has died.

4. Women and men, in age and youth, can feel the Spirit, hear the call,

and find the way, the life, the truth, revealed in Jesus, freed for all.

5. Christ is alive, and comes to bring good news to this and every age,

till earth and sky and ocean ring with joy, with justice, love and praise.

Prayer of the Day (Prayer used by permission of Augsburg Fortress)

* Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Let us pray.

Almighty and ever-living God, you hold together all things in heaven and on earth. In

your great mercy receive the prayers of all your children, and give to all the world the Spirit of your truth and peace, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Scripture Readings

First Reading: Acts 17:22-31

(In Athens, Paul faces the challenge of proclaiming the gospel to Greeks who know nothing of either Jewish or Christian tradition. He proclaims that the “unknown god” whom they worship is the true Lord of heaven and earth who will judge the world with justice through Jesus, whom God has raised from the dead.)

Acts 17: Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, “Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, ‘To an unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. From one ancestor he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him—though indeed he is not far from each one of us. For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we too are his offspring.’ Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold, or silver, or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals. While God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

Word of God. Word of Life.

Thanks be to God.

Psalm: Psalm 66:8-20

8 Bless our God, you peoples;

let the sound of praise be heard.

9 Our God has kept us among the living

and has not allowed our feet to slip. R

10 For you, O God, have tested us;

you have tried us just as silver is tried.

11 You brought us into the net;

you laid heavy burdens upon our backs.

12 You let people ride over our heads; we went through fire and water,

but you brought us out into a place of refreshment.

13 I will enter your house with burnt offerings

and will pay you my vows—

14 those that I promised with my lips

and spoke with my mouth when I was in trouble.

15 I will offer you burnt offerings of fatlings with the smoke of rams;

I will give you oxen and goats. R

16 Come and listen, all you who believe,

and I will tell you what God has done for me.

17 I called out to God with my mouth,

and praised the Lord with my tongue.

18 If I had cherished evil in my heart,

the Lord would not have heard me;

19 but in truth God has heard me

and has attended to the sound of my prayer.

20 Blessed be God, who has not rejected my prayer,

nor withheld unfailing love from me. R

1 Peter 3:13-22* (The days of Noah, a sign of baptism )

A reading from the First Letter of Peter

Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good? But even if you do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear, and do not be intimidated, but in your hearts sanctify Christ as Lord. Always be ready to make your defence to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and reverence. Keep your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who abuse you for your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if suffering should be God's will, than to suffer for doing evil. For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God.

The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Gospel Acclamation:

All: Alleluia, Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.

Alleluia, Alleluia!

Gospel: John 14:15-21

(Christ our advocate (In final words to his disciples on the night of his arrest, Jesus encourages obedience to his commandments and speaks of the Spirit, who will be with them forever.)

The Holy Gospel according to St. John 14

Glory to you, O Lord

[Jesus said to the disciples:] “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. “I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.”

Here ends the Gospel

Praise to you, O Christ.

Sermon: provided to ELCIC congregations by Bishop Susan Johnson

Apostles' Creed

I believe in God, the Father almighty,

creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord,

who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,

born of the virgin Mary,

suffered under Pontius Pilate,

was crucified, died, and was buried;

he descended to the dead.

On the third day he rose again;

he ascended into heaven,

he is seated at the right hand of the Father,

and he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

the holy catholic church,

the communion of saints,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the body,

and the life everlasting. Amen.

Offering prayer

Prayers of the People

* Celebrating the victory of love over death, we offer our prayers to God.

[Short pause]

* God who is love, your love fills our universe, and spills into our lives. We give thanks for this amazing gift.