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Lord, from Psalm 122, I was glad when they said to me, let us go to the house of the Lord.
Our feet have been standing within your gates, oh Jerusalem. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem. May they be secure who love you. Peace be within your walls and security within your towers. For my brothers and companions' sake, I will say, peace be with you.
For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your good. Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever. Amen, let us pray.
Lord God, make her of heaven and earth and give her of life. We give thanks for all the mercies that you granted to Judy during her earthly life, especially for calling her to faith in Jesus Christ through holy baptism.
Comfort all who mourn her death with the hope of the glorious resurrection of the body and the happy reunion in heaven. Remind us that we too are mortal and prepare us to fall asleep in faith and on the last day receive the glory promised to all who trust in your beloved Son, even Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, amen.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. In holy baptism, Judy Hollander was clothed with the robe of Christ's righteousness that covered all of her sin. St. Paul says, do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ were baptized into his death?
In order. You may be seated. Congregation, please remain standing, my apologies. Lord, have mercy upon us. The Lord be with you. And also with you. Let us pray. O God of grace and mercy, we give thanks for your loving kindness shown to Judy and to all your servants who, having finished their course in faith, now rest from their labors.
Grant that we may also be faithful unto death and receive the crown of eternal life through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, amen.
You may be seated. The Old Testament reading is taken from the prophet Isaiah chapter 25. On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well-refined.
And he will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces.
And the reproach of his people he will take away from all of the earth, for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, behold, this is our God. We have waited for him that he might save us. This is the Lord we have waited for him.
Let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Our next hymn is 562. You'll pull out your handout, Psalm 118. We're gonna chant this using Psalm tone H. Out of my distress I called on the Lord.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord. It is better to take refuge in the Lord. I was pushed hard so that I was falling. The Lord is my strength and my song. Bad songs of salvation are the tents of the righteous.
The right hand of the Lord exalts. I shall not die, but I shall live. Glory be to the Father and to the Son. And to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever. Amen. Out of my distress I called on the Lord.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord. The epistle is taken from 2 Corinthians chapter four. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed. Perplexed, but not driven to despair. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. Always carrying in the body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you. Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, I believed and so I spoke, we also believe and so we also speak.
Knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence. For it is all for your sake so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving to the glory of God.
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison as we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen.
For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. This is the word of the Lord. Alleluia, Jesus Christ is the firstborn of the dead. To him. The holy gospel according to St. Matthew, the 27th chapter.
Please rise. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters and they gathered the whole battalion before him and they stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him and twisting together a crown of thorns they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand and kneeling before him they mocked him saying, hail, king of the Jews.
And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him and led him away to crucify him. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name.
They compelled this man to carry Jesus's cross. And when they came to a place called Golgotha, which means place of a skull, they offered him wine to drink mixed with gall, but when he tasted it, he would not drink it.
And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. And they sat down and kept watch over him there. And over his head, they put the charge against him, which read, this is Jesus, the king of the Jews.
Then two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, you who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself.
If you are the son of God, come down from the cross. So also the chief priests with the scribes and the elders, they mocked him saying, he saved others. He cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel.
Let him come down now from the cross and we will believe in him. He trusts in God. Let God deliver him now if he desires him. For he said, I am the son of God. And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way.
Now from the sixth hour, there was darkness over all of the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, that is, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
And some of the bystanders hearing it said, this man is calling Elijah. And one of them at once ran and took a sponge and filled it with sour wine and put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink. But the other said, wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to save him.
And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and he yielded up his spirit. And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And the earth shook and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened.
And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. And coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. When the centurion and those who were with him keeping watch over Jesus saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, truly, this was the Son of God.
This is the gospel of the Lord. We confess our faith together in the words of the Apostles' Creed. Give me a second here. I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his 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 into hell. The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. From thence he will come to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. You may be seated. In the name of Jesus.
Amen. Judy Hollander is my mother-in-law, and I refuse to say she was. Am I crazy for saying such a thing? Well, that's kind of the whole point of being a Christian, isn't it? You'll note that there is a corpse here.
Those of you who got here early enough, you were able to see her corpse. And the reason why there's a corpse is because of sin. I can tell you this about my mother-in-law. She was a sinner. Her death proves it.
But the reality is that we all know that being part of a family is a tough thing. This is the first funeral that I've ever done where I was part of the family. It's a little easier when the person that has died is not a close family member.
And the reason being is because there's lots of emotion. There's a lot of emotion. There's regrets. There's bad memories. There are good memories. I can say legitimately, I've probably seen Judy at her worst.
But I could say the same, that she saw me at my worst. She knew me when I was a selfish teenager. She knew me when I was at my absolute worst. She was there for the bumps and bruises along the way in the early part of my marriage.
And you'll note that there were times in our life with Judy where our relationship was strained. But I would note, none of that means anything. Because here's the thing. We like to think that death is the thing that separates us from each other, and it's not.
Death is not the thing that separates us from each other. It's sin. And the reality is that Judy, she's with us now more than those people in our family whose relationships we have that are strained. Because sin is the thing that is separated all of us.
And so what I find fascinating, Barb this week, has been doing the loving, caring task of walking through her mother's mementos and memories and things that she left from her childhood and from other parts of her life.
And Barb found her baptism certificate. And Judy was baptized into Christ's death and into his resurrection in the year 1951. She was five years old when she was baptized. And of all the places, she was baptized at Messiah Lutheran Church in Pasadena, California.
Which I always kind of find to be fascinating. That she was baptized as a Lutheran, and for the past seven years, Judy has attended Kongsvinger's online services. First in the Aletheia services, as well as our Kongsvinger services.
And the one thing I can tell you is that for the past seven years, despite the fact that my mother-in-law knew full well that I was a sinner and I don't wear black theoretically, I wear black for a very specific reason.
She knew my sins. She was all too familiar with my shortcomings and my selfishness. She was all too familiar with just how awful I could be. And despite all of that, I was her pastor for the past seven years.
How is that possible? The only way that is possible is because Jesus Christ is the one who has preceded us all in death. You'll note that one of the things that happens when you read an obituary, it talks about the people who have preceded the dead person in death.
But there's always a name missing, all right? It talks about their family members, maybe their father, their mother, or their sisters have preceded them in death. But the reality is this, is there is one who has preceded all of us in death, and his name should be written in every one of these obituaries, and that's Jesus Christ.
And unlike you and I, his death was not because of any sin that he committed. His death was because he was suffering in our place so that we can be forgiven of God. Every single one of us has sinned grievously against God in thought, word, deed, the things we've done, the things we've left undone, the things we've done horribly to each other.
And Christianity is not a religion that teaches that if you do good things, God's gonna reward you with eternal life. That is complete hogwash, and anyone who says such a thing is a heretic. Christianity teaches us that Christ died for the ungodly.
Christianity is a religion for losers. It is a religion for those who are dying, and rightly so. It is not a religion for people who are trying to make their lives better by being gooder and trying harder.
It is a religion that is filled with sinners who are forgiven by Christ shed blood on the cross, and therefore have been reconciled to God, not because of anything spectacular that they have done, but because Christ has preceded them in death.
He suffered on the cross so that you and I would not have to suffer eternity in hell. We read in our gospel text today the account of Christ's crucifixion, and we heard those who were mocking Christ while he was nailed to the cross, people deriding him, wagging their heads at him, saying, you who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself.
But the thing is, Christ has preceded us in death not in order to save himself. He has preceded us in death in order to save you, in order to save me, in order to save Judy Macken. He wasn't saving himself.
If you are the son of God, come down from the cross, they mocked and derided him. The chief priests and the scribes and the elders mocked him, saying, well, he saved others, and he cannot save himself.
That's kind of the whole point. He wasn't there to save himself. If he's the king of Israel, let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. But he said that the sign that he was sent by God would be this, that after they had torn down his body and crucified him and killed him, he would raise it again on the third day.
See, Christ hasn't merely preceded us in death. He's also preceded us in the resurrection. And when Judy was baptized into Christ in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit back in 1951, the scriptures are very clear.
All of her sins were washed away at that point. And Judy died. She was buried with Christ, and she was raised with Christ. The death that took place a couple weeks ago is inconsequential. It doesn't matter what the date of that death was.
Quite frankly, I don't even remember it. I don't know if I want to. The date that matters regarding when Judy died is when back in 1951, when she received the forgiveness of her sins, new life in Christ, raised from the dead.
Judy lived her entire life with one foot already in heaven. And I can tell you, if there was ever a sinner slash saint at the same time, it was Judy. But that's all of us. Saved others, he can't save himself.
If he's the king of Israel, let him come down from the cross, but he didn't. He stayed on the cross the entire time allotted. The son of God, suffering, bleeding, and dying for your rebellious sin and mine.
He trusts in God, let God deliver him now if he desires him, and God did deliver him from death. And that's kind of the point, because we know this, that Judy's temporary time in the grave is nothing compared to what awaits her in the resurrection.
And same with all who believe in Christ. I know it sounds crazy. You guys actually believe that God's gonna raise corpses from the dead? Yeah. You know why? Because Jesus rose from the dead. And until you have better credentials than him, I'm not gonna listen to you, I'm gonna listen to him.
He rose from the dead and he promised that anyone who believes in him, even though he die, yet shall he live. Anyone who believes in him, he said, will never die. So I can honestly say Judy's alive right now.
She is my mother-in-law, she wasn't my mother-in-law, she is presently now. It's just that she got to see Jesus before I did. And if she rubs it in when I get there, I'm just gonna have to just have words with her, right?
But those will be glorious words. So the text goes on to say, regarding Christ's suffering, from the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole land. While Christ was bleeding on the cross, the sun stopped shining at noon and it didn't shine for three hours.
It's as if the creation itself couldn't look at its creator bleeding, suffering, and dying. And about the ninth hour, three in the afternoon, the same time in which all the Passover lambs are slaughtered the time of the evening sacrifice, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Theologians call this the cry of dereliction. That time when you get to see just what happens. I've already told you, it is not death that separates us from each other, it's sin. That being the case, here, Jesus bearing your sin, my sin upon himself on the cross, suffering in our place.
God made Jesus to be the sinner. And God the father forsook Christ the son. You see, sin not only separates us from each other, it separates us from God. But here, while Christ is bearing your sin and mine, it separated Christ from the father.
But the whole point of it is this. Christ was forsaken on the cross so that you wouldn't have to be. Christ bled and died in your place so that even though you die, you will live forever. And I can tell you this from experience.
Life goes quick. It goes so fast. It was yesterday. You'll see the wedding photos of my wife and I's wedding. It's in the scrapbook that Barb put together. It'll be at our house this afternoon. All of you are invited to come and spend some time sharing a meal and enjoying our time together.
But you'll see that just yesterday, I didn't have a beard. I didn't have any gray hair. I was skinny. I looked pretty good, right? And my wife, she was hot, okay? But there in the photos standing next to us is Judy.
Alive and smiling. And it struck me that as I looked at those photos that Judy in those photos was younger than I am now. And that was just yesterday. That was yesterday. And so you'll note, we don't have a lot of time.
You don't have a lot of time. It's tomorrow that you're gonna be the one in the casket. It's that fast. And so I would appeal to you in this. Note then that the gospel teaches us that Christ died for our sins, all of them, to reconcile us to God.
So that we would not be forsaken in the fires of hell, but could enjoy all for free as a gift, eternal life in a world without end where it promises, God promises to wipe away every tear from our eyes.
That is the world that is coming. There is a joyous, there is a joyous reunion coming. When I will see Judy again. Y 'all will see Judy again. Some of you, you have to get to know her. You barely even know her at all.
But I assure you, you will love her wicked wit and humor. But she's alive right now. And we confess that we worship with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven who laud and magnify Christ's glorious name.
That being the case, then I defy you to tell me that she isn't here now worshiping with us, with the saints who have preceded us. And with Christ himself. Where two or more gathered, Christ is truly present.
He is present here today. And he is present here today not to scold you. He's here to comfort you. And to make an appeal to you, to repent of your sin, to be forgiven, to be reconciled to God, but more importantly, to be reconciled to each other.
How can any of us say that we are Christians and bear a grudge against another? How can any of us say that we worship Christ and refuse to be reconciled to each other, especially those who also confess Christ?
Do we not pray in the Lord's prayer, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us? Indeed we do. So brothers and sisters, note here. Judy is now with Christ. She has seen him face to face.
She finished her race in the faith. And I can say this with all confidence. It was fascinating when I woke up that Saturday morning and she was already gone. Because as she was doing hospice in our house, it was terrible to watch as she continued to slowly slip away.
It was terrible. There was nothing good about it. And don't anyone tell me that death is a friend. It's not. It's an enemy. And I hate the fact that death came into my house. But all of that being said, as she was slipping away slowly, she was lying there off to one side, her mouth gaping open, and every breath seemed like it was a laborious breath.
But on that Saturday morning when we woke up and she was gone, her mouth was closed and there was a wry smile on her face. It was unmistakable. I know for a fact that the angels came and took her to be with Christ.
And the last thing she saw in this earth was the beginning of the heavenly wonders that she is seeing now. And brothers and sisters, she desires for you to be with her. She desires for you to have that same joy.
And that joy is not available to anyone who strives to earn it, for anyone who wants to pay for it, who anyone thinks that they can earn their way to it by doing good and trying harder. Maybe if I just stop cussing more, that I can finally earn heaven.
Or maybe if I lose 50 or 60 pounds, maybe Jesus will let me into heaven. All that is nonsense. Christ has died for our sins, every single one of them. And salvation and eternal life is a gift given by God's great mercy, His grace.
And I would note His extravagant kindness. And dare I say it, extravagant. Because heaven is going to be filled with nothing but a whole bunch of rabble-rousing ungodly sinners who deserve nothing but hell itself, but instead were given mercy.
There's going to be tax collectors. There will be prostitutes. There will be criminals. There will be old, retired sheriffs. There will be at least one attorney, maybe not more. All right? There might even be a few pastors there.
But the point is this, is that everybody who is there, they're not there because they were the smartest ones in the bunch. They were not there because they made a personal decision to ask Jesus into their heart.
They were not there because they gave up drinking, dancing, smoking, and chewing, which sounds like a terrible way to live this life, by the way. They are all there because Christ was forsaken by God on the cross.
He bled and suffered and died in your place and mine, and gives us salvation as a free gift. And he calls us all to simply believe, trust in his mercy, believe that God does not will for you to perish, but that you would have eternal life.
All because Jesus, on a Friday afternoon, sometime in human history, about 2 ,000 years ago, right outside the gates of Jerusalem, he bore your sins in his body on the cross. God made him to be sin who knew no sins, that you might be the righteousness of God.
And he's forgiven all of us. So brothers and sisters, as much as I am sad, and as much as my emotions have been all over the place, I will continue to defiantly say that although Judy truly is a sinner, she truly blew it big time.
And so have I. I can also say she was truly forgiven by Christ, and her hope and confidence wasn't in her own good works, but in the works performed by Christ, his perfect sinless life, his vicarious death on the cross, and she died in the faith.
Which means that when Jesus returns in glory to judge the living and the dead, he will call her from the grave into a world without end. And all who believe in him also will share in that with her. So I have nothing really to lament at this point.
Nothing at all. In fact, I am just joyously waiting and looking forward to the great reunion. In the middle of it, I'll be sad. I'll continue to ponder my memories. But the one thing I can say with certainty is that Christ has proceeded us all in death.
Judy, you, all of us. And all who were baptized into him, all who trust in his name, he will raise on the last day. So despite the fact that when Christ died, the rocks were split, the temple curtain was torn in two, it also says the tombs were opened, and indeed they were.
And so you'll note then, in our epistle text, Paul writes, since we all have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, I believed and so I spoke. We also believe and so also we speak, knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and he will bring you into his presence.
These words are sure, these are certain and true. You are foolish to doubt them if you do. For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people, grace has extended to so many people that it extends all the way to a small congregation in the middle of nowhere Minnesota, where we are gathered today.
It extends to more and more people so that it may increase thanksgiving to the glory of God. So then, we do not lose heart, though our outer nature is wasting away, and Judy's has now too. Our inner nature, the one given to us in baptism, it is being renewed day by day.
For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we now look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen. And see, that's kind of the point.
Right now, we see a coffin draped with a paw. Earlier today, we saw a corpse inside of that coffin. But here's the thing. Everything that you can see with your eyes right now is transient, it's fading.
This building, your body, your car, your house, your family, it's all transient. Everything that is seen is passing away. It is the things that are not seen, they are the things that are eternal. The thing you cannot see right now is Judy's soul.
But her soul is with Christ, the scriptures assure us. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. And don't think that somehow that the things that you can touch right now are somehow gonna be here for very long.
In fact, the very knuckles that you use to touch the wood, to knock on it, those knuckles will be gone soon enough as well. But if you are in Christ, you have been buried with him in his death, raised with him in his resurrection, have your sins washed away, feasted on his body and blood, given and shed for the forgiveness of your sins, abided in his word, then note then everything that you see even though it's transient and passing away, that what Christ has deposited inside of you, that eternal bit, the new person that you are in Christ that you cannot see with your eyes, but you know is there by faith, that is the thing that is eternal.
So brothers, in light of this eternity, let us again take confidence in the forgiveness won by Christ. Let us then by the power of the Holy Spirit mortify our sinful flesh and its evil sinful desires.
Let us repent of the sins that we have committed that have separated us from each other even though we live. And let us live in the forgiveness won by Christ. And let our actions be true with a confession of one who says that they believe in Jesus the crucified, the one who bled and died for your sins.
Don't tell me you believe in Jesus and refuse to be reconciled to those around you. That is not a proper confession. In fact, the one who doesn't forgive, Christ doesn't forgive either. So if your confession is in Christ, repent and be reconciled to those who you've allowed sin to alienate yourself from.
This is the will of God. And I would also know it's Judy's also her will expressed that there be faith, love, reconciliation and peace among those whom she loved. So my dear mother-in-law, thank you for letting this sinner be your pastor.
Letting this sinner preach to you the good news that Christ has bled and died for you. Thank you for letting this sinner be with you in your closing days. And I look forward to being reunited with my mother-in-law when Jesus returns.
In Jesus name, amen. Our next hymn is 676. Congregation, please rise for the prayers of the church. Let us pray to the Lord our God and father who raised Jesus from the dead. Almighty God, you have knit your chosen people together into one communion into the mystical body of your son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Give to your whole church in heaven on earth, your light and your peace. Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Grant that all who have been baptized into Christ's death and resurrection may die to sin and rise to newness of life.
And so pass with him through the gate of death and the grave into our joyful resurrection. Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Grant that all who have been nourished by the holy body and blood of your son may be raised to immortality and incorruption to be seated with him at your heavenly banquet.
Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Give to the family of Judy Hollander and all who mourn comfort in their grief and assure confidence in your loving care, that casting all their sorrow on you, they may know the consolation of your love.
Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Give courage and faith to the bereaved that within the communion of your church, they may have strength to meet the days ahead in the assurance of a holy and certain hope and in the joyful expectation of eternal life with those they love who have departed in the faith.
Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Help us, we pray, in the midst of things we cannot understand, to believe and find comfort in the communion of the saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Look graciously upon those who mourn the death of a beloved mother and grandmother and bring them to a joyous and blessed reunion in heaven. Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer.
Receive our thanks for Judy Hollander and for all the blessings you bestowed on her in this earthly life. Bring us at last to our heavenly home that with her we may see you face to face in the joys of paradise.
Lord in your mercy. Hear our prayer. Oh God of all grace, you sent your son, our savior, Jesus Christ, to bring life and immortality to light. We give you thanks that by his death he destroyed the power of death.
By his resurrection he opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. Strengthen us in the confidence that because he lives, we shall live also and that neither death nor life nor things present nor things to come will be able to separate us from your love which is in Christ Jesus our Lord who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit.
One God, now and forever. Amen. Taught by our Lord and trusting in his promises, we are bold to pray. Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.
Amen. I am the resurrection and the life, says the Lord. He who believes in me will live even though he dies. Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. I am the resurrection and the life, says the Lord.
He who believes in me even though he dies and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. The Lord be with you. And also with you. Let us pray. Lord God, our shepherd, you gathered the lambs of your flock into the arms of your mercy and bring them home.
Comfort us with a certain hope of the resurrection to everlasting life and a joyful reunion with those we love who have died in the faith. Through Jesus Christ, your son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
Amen. Amen. Let us bless the Lord. Thanks be to God. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine on you and be gracious to you. Lord, lift up his countenance upon you and give you his peace.
Amen. Let us go forth in peace.