Ash Wednesday Service

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Yeah, that is terrible.
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I would like to welcome you all to Cotton's Finger Lutheran Church. Today is
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Ash Wednesday, and a little bit of a note, this is obviously a modified liturgy, so those of you who are physically present, there's an extra bulletin that has the
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Ash Wednesday liturgy with a litany and other things.
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When we finish the litany and the confession of our sins, then, if you would like, you can come forward, and you come forward one at a time, one by one, you just make a line, and for the imposition of ashes.
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What I do is I take what's left of our palm fronds from last
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Palm Sunday, burn them thoroughly in my barbecue, and then take the ashes, and using a mortar and pestle, bring them down to dust form, and then put a little bit of olive oil, and then what
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I'll do is I'll make the sign of your cross on your forehead, and then say these words, remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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This is a very interesting practice, and a good one, remembering our mortality, invoking
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God's words, what God spoke to Adam when he punished him after sinning in the garden.
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So all of that being said, I'm going to travel up to the altar, and then we will get rolling.
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Congregation, please rise. In the name of the
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Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. I will go to the altar of God.
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Our help is in the name of the Lord. To brothers and sisters of our
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Lord Jesus Christ, on this day, the church begins a holy season of prayerful and penitential reflection.
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Our attention is especially directed to the holy sufferings and death of our Lord Jesus Christ. From ancient times, the season of Lent has been kept as a time of special devotion, self -denial, and humble repentance born of a faithful heart that dwells confidently on his word and draws from it life and hope.
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Throughout this holy season, let us pray that our dear Father in heaven, for the sake of his beloved Son and in the power of his
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Holy Spirit, might richly bless this Lenten tide for us, so that we may come to Easter with glad hearts and keep the feast in sincerity and truth.
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O Lord, have mercy. O Christ, have mercy. O Lord, have mercy.
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O Christ, have mercy. God, the Father in heaven, have mercy. God, the
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Son, Redeemer of the world, have mercy. God, the Holy Spirit, have mercy.
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Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us.
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Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. Be gracious to us. By your holy incarnation, by your holy nativity, by your baptism, fasting, and temptation, by your agony and bloody sweat, by your cross and passion, by your precious death and burial, by your glorious resurrection and ascension, by the coming of the
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Holy Spirit, the Comforter, in all time of our tribulation, in all time of our prosperity, in the hour of death, and in the day of judgment.
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We, poor sinners, implore you to prosper the preaching of your word, to bless our prayer and meditation, to strengthen and preserve us in the true faith, and to give heart to our sorrow and strength to our repentance, to draw all to yourself, to bless those who are instructed in the faith, to watch over and console the poor, the sick, the distressed, the lonely, the forsaken, the abandoned, and all who stand in need of our prayers, to give abundant blessing to all works of mercy, and to have mercy on us all, to turn our hearts to you, to turn the hearts of our enemies, persecutors, and slanderers, and to graciously hear our prayers.
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Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Christ, the
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Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,
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Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, O Christ, O Lord, O Christ, O Lord, O God, you desire not the death of sinners, but rather that they turn from their wickedness and live.
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We implore you to have compassion on the frailty of our mortal nature, for we acknowledge that we are dust, and to dust we shall return.
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Mercifully pardon our sins that we may obtain the promises that you have laid up for those who are repentant through Jesus Christ, your
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Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Beloved in the
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Lord, let us draw near with a true heart and confess our sins unto God, our Father, beseeching him in the name of our
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Lord Jesus Christ to grant us forgiveness. Our help is in the name of the Lord. I said
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I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord. Almighty God, merciful
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Father, I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess unto you all my sins and iniquities with which
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I have ever offended you and justly deserve your temporal and eternal punishment.
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But I am heartily sorry for them and sincerely repent of them, and I pray you of your boundless mercy and for the sake of the holy, innocent, bitter sufferings and death of your beloved
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Son, Jesus Christ, to be gracious and merciful to me, a poor, sinful being.
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Upon this, your confession, I, by virtue of my office as a cold and ordained servant of the Word, I announce the grace of God unto all of you, and in the stead and by the command of my
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Lord Jesus Christ, I forgive you all of your sins. In the name of the Father and the Son and the
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Holy Spirit, amen. We continue with the imposition of ashes.
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My request is that you come up in a single file line. Lily, remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Lift your hair.
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There we go. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.
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Congregation, please rise. We'll continue with the Order of Vespers on page 229. O Lord, open my lips.
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Make haste, O God, to deliver me. Glory be to the
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Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever.
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Amen. Praise to you, O Christ, Lamb of our salvation.
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We will chant Psalm 51 together by half verse using psalm tone
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C. Psalm 51 is in the front of your hymnal. Have mercy on me,
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O God, according to your steadfast love. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity.
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For I know my transgressions Against you, you only, have
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I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity.
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Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean.
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Let me hear joy and gladness. Hide your face from my sins.
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Create in me a clean heart, O God. Cast me not away from your presence.
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Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Then I will teach transgressors your ways.
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Deliver me from blood guiltiness, O Lord God, O God of my salvation.
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O Lord, open my lips. For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it.
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The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. Do good to Zion in your good pleasure.
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Then you will delight in right sacrifices, in burnt offerings, in whole burnt offerings.
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Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the
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Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever.
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Amen. The opening hymn is 607. You may be seated.
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The Old Testament reading for Ash Wednesday is taken from the prophet Joel chapter 2. Yet, even now, declares the
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Lord, return to me with all of your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning, and rend your hearts and not your garments.
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Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.
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And he relents over disaster. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the
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Lord your God. Blow the trumpet in Zion. Consecrate a fast. Call a solemn assembly.
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Gather the people. Consecrate the congregation. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, even the nursing infants.
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Let the bridegroom leave his room and the bride her chamber. Between the vestibule and the altar, let the priests and the ministers of the
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Lord weep and say, spare your people, O Lord, and make not your heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations.
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Why should they say among the peoples, where is their God? Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people.
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And the Lord answered and said to his people, behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied, and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.
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O Lord, have mercy on us. Our epistle is taken from 2
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Peter 1. May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our
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Lord. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.
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For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue and virtue with knowledge and knowledge with self -control and self -control with steadfastness and steadfastness with godliness and godliness with brotherly affection and brotherly affection with love.
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For if these qualities are yours and increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our
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Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.
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Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fall.
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For in this way, there will be richly provided for you an interest into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
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O Lord, have mercy on us. Please rise for the gospel. The holy gospel according to St.
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Matthew, the sixth chapter. And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so that their fasting may be seen by others.
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Truly I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head, wash your face, so that your fasting may not be seen by others, but your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret, he will reward you.
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Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
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For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. O Lord, have mercy on us.
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Remain standing for the responsory. Deliver me,
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O Lord, my God, for you are the God of my salvation.
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In you, O Lord, do I put my trust. Leave me not,
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O Lord, my God. Deliver me,
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O Lord, my God, for you are the God of my salvation.
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You may be seated. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
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Disaster. That's a terrible word to say. We all know a thing or two about disasters.
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We talk about natural disasters. We talk about family disasters and disasters of all different kinds, right?
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But you're going to note here, how has sin worked out for all of y 'all? Hasn't that been a complete disaster?
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And what it has done to our lives? And you'll note that y 'all have ashes on your foreheads, which reminds you of what?
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Of the words of God that he spoke to Adam in the garden. You are dust and to dust you shall return.
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You'll note that the wages of sin is death and death has been a disaster. Sin has been a disaster.
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How many of you have ever met your great, great, great grandparents? Do you even know their names?
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I couldn't even know, I don't even know some of their names without having to look in ancestry .com and there are names that are missing in my family tree.
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Probably in yours too. You'll note that it takes a lot of vigilant work to figure out who you're related to and who your ancestors are and sometimes we're only able to get details going back on one or two branches, not much farther back.
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Isn't that a disaster if you think about it? People that you are flesh and blood relatives of.
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People you have descended from whose stories you don't even know because you don't even know their names or where they're from or anybody that can remember them or any accounts written about them.
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It's a complete disaster. When you think about what happens to us when we die, let me just put this bluntly,
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I know how the procedure goes. I've gone through the procedure a few times here at Kongsvinger.
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You know what's going to happen? You're going to get sick. We're going to pray for you. You're going to get worse and then finally we're going to sit down with you either in your home or in hospice and we're going to walk you through the prayers of those, the commendation of the dying and then what's going to happen is you're going to die.
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Your family will mourn, your friends will mourn and those here at church will mourn for you. They will write an obituary.
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It'll be roughly a paragraph and a half, two paragraphs long and then we're going to take your corpse and we're going to put you in the yard out there and you know what's going to happen?
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The only thing that's going to be on there is your name and two dates, when you were born and when you died and all the people that know you will follow you.
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They'll be put into the yard as well and eventually memories of when
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Pastor Roseborough was pastor of Kongsvinger Lutheran Church will be long in the past and nobody will be talking about any of us.
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In fact, you might even be lucky enough to have your stone get moved or knocked over or whatever and somebody, you know, get out one of those mower things and go, oh wow, what's this, who's
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Marilyn Mathson, right? That's the kind of things we're talking about. It's a complete disaster, sin has been but you'll note that God does not threaten us merely with the disaster of death.
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I mean, that would be bad enough but the real disaster that we've all faced is because of our sin and that is the second death.
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Have you read the details on second death? You remember the movie like The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Rings? You know, those hobbits, they had breakfast and then second breakfast and elevensies and stuff like this.
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There's death and then there's second death. Yeah, there's a second death and the details of it are terrifying and we've all earned second death and second death is an eternity in hell.
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Being punished for our sins and so you'll note that when we come around to a penitential season, this follows a pattern from the
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Old Testament as they were getting close to the day of atonement, God required the children of Israel to not come into his presence for the day of atonement, the holy convocation without first afflicting themselves, prayer and fasting and lament over their own sins.
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We do the same. We are getting ready to get to the season of our great day of atonement, the day that Christ was crucified for your sins and mine on the cross and should we not, in memory and commemoration of that sacrifice, should we not anew consider our own sin?
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Consider the sin that still so closely clings to us, that tangles us up in our course as Christians, that sin that you've, well, maybe you've just become somewhat comfortable with.
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You know, it says in Scripture, we're to mortify our sinful flesh, but have you ever noticed that continual hostilities with your sinful flesh oftentimes are just exhausting?
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Who can go an entire lifetime in warfare against their own sinful flesh?
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I've got to admit there's been times when I've wanted to just wave the white flag and that's not what we're called to do.
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And so we consider then our Old Testament text and I also, I always like to throw in that alternate
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Old Testament text because it's so wonderful because here's the thing. When in the daily struggle against sin, against death, against Satan, against the world, against all these forces of darkness that would lead us into death, you'll note that we all have that icky, creepy feeling, that feeling of foreboding that tells us what?
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You know, I'm really not somebody who's got my act together. I still struggle with sin and one has to wonder at times, is
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God going to really let me into heaven because I really haven't figured this
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Christianity thing out very well. If by well, I mean totally mortifying my sinful flesh and living in victory over the temptations that hit me every day.
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It's not my lot. You'll note the Apostle Paul, that wasn't his either. The Apostle Paul lamented, he said, the things
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I want to do, I don't do. The things I don't want to do, I keep on doing. Who will deliver me from this body of death?
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That sounds like something I could have written. Probably something you could have as well. But you'll note our
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Old Testament text says this, yet even now, declares Yahweh, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, with mourning.
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Rend your hearts, not your garments. That's right. You'll note that oftentimes there's displays of repentance in the
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Old Testament where people have taken their clothes and torn them in half. It's like, God's saying, keep your clothes on.
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You paid good money for those things. I had to supply you with the ability to put on those clothes.
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Don't rip them up. Instead, rend your heart. Recognize that God's holy law demands perfection of you and you haven't lived up to it.
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And as a result of it, you have earned for yourself God's wrath. Oh, that's what it says at the close of the commandments.
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Read your catechism. But God says to us, return to the Lord your God. Why? He's gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and, oh, best words ever, he relents over disaster.
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You know, the disaster of death. The disaster of the second death that impends all of us.
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You'll note that every account in the Scriptures of people repenting upon hearing the word of God, they stand as examples to us, calling us to do the same, to repent.
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And oh, it's the story of the Ninevites that just stands out here. Over and again it cracks me up when you read the prophet
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Jonah. This is a fellow who was told by God to go preach repentance to Nineveh, a bunch of Assyrian war criminals, the best way to think about it.
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Assyrians were so cruel in warfare that they make Hamas, they make the
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Nazis look like a bunch of amateur schoolgirls at best when it comes to warfare.
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The Ninevites, these are people who when they attacked a city and they finally overthrew that city, you know what they did?
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When they overthrew that city, they gathered up all the men who fought against them, and then what they did is they put their bodies on a pike and then hauled their carcasses up in the air to basically stand as a warning.
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You oppose us, you fight against us, this is what happens to people like that.
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And how, you'll note that the Geneva Convention wasn't around back then, and I can legitimately say taking captured soldiers and killing them and putting them up on a spike, that that is against the
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Geneva Convention. That's cruelty that's not permitted in warfare. Ninevites didn't care.
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They were violent, bloodthirsty, awful, terrible people. If there was ever a group of people that deserved to go to hell, a whole lot of them deserve that.
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But I would note they're not that much different than Minnesotans. Okay. Or North Dakotans.
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You guys are transplants now, right? Yeah, we've all earned God's wrath.
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So what does Jonah do when told by God to go and preach to the Ninevites?
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He says, no way, Jose. That's not actually what he said. I don't think he spoke
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Spanish. Maybe internally he said, local cocktail. No, no, no, no good. Off he went to Tarshish, right?
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And of course we know how the story goes. There was a storm. They cast lots, asked what was going on.
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He explained to them he was running away from Yahweh. They recognized the storm was because of him. And so they fed
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Jonah to the sea, tossed him into the sea as a sacrifice. And a big fish came and swallowed him up.
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I always think this is God's sense of humor because what an uncomfortable, miserable three days that had to have been.
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How was he able to breathe? He has some kind of an air pocket. And let me tell you, the air pocket inside of a fish's gut cannot possibly smell good, right?
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This is where you pray for nose blindness to kick in quick. And after three days, there's this wonderful prayer where Jonah sounds like he's praying a prayer that Christ prayed when he was, after he had been crucified and died.
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Seaweed wrapped around his head. And God resurrected poor Jonah and caused him to be fish vomit for a day.
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And then one has to wonder, how many days or weeks did it take to get the smell out of his clothes, out of his hair, out of his beard?
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Ugh. But chapter three is our alternative text here. And here's what it says.
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The word of Yahweh came to Jonah the second time, saying, arise and go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.
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And you'll note that Jonah, second time around, was Johnny on the spot. He got a bus ticket immediately, right?
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Hopped on board that greyhound and head on down to Nineveh, as he was supposed to. So he went to Nineveh according to the word of Yahweh.
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Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days' journey in breath. And Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey, and he called out, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
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What a great, interesting message. Hmm. That number 40 is kind of a big deal, if you think about it.
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40 days, 40 nights, it rained on the earth and the flood came upon humanity.
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The children of Israel wandered in the wilderness for 40 years. Christ was tempted in the wilderness for 40 days.
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And here, 40 days, Nineveh shall be overthrown. You'll note then, that 40 days makes it so that Jonah's message hits us today.
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Because we recognize that at the end of this 40 days, this wilderness time here for us on this planet, the entire earth will be overthrown.
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Have you not read the book of Revelation? Have you not read Christ's Olivet Discourse?
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There is a day coming, and it's gonna be at the end of these 40 days, that our whole world will be overthrown because of sin.
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Just look at the world outside, watch the news if you wanna get depressed, and you can see the whole world has lost its ever -living mind.
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We've gotta be closer to Jesus' return than ever. Indeed, we are. But 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
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And what did these brutal, violent war criminals who murdered so many men and people and widowed so many women and orphaned so many children, what did they do with the preaching of Jonah and this message of his?
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They believed God. It just says that. The thing is, is that the scriptures say that we all have the law of God written on our hearts.
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Every one of us. This is the reason why we intuitively know what is good and what is evil.
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And with every murdered soldier, with every widow that they made, every orphan that they created, they knew that they were transgressing
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God's law that says you will not murder. They were even acting against their own conscience in their own violence.
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And then hearing the real words of God from a real prophet of God, threatening them with punishment, they knew they deserved what
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God was going to give them. So what did they do? They called a fast. They put on sackcloth from the greatest of them to the least of them.
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And the word itself, the word of God in the mouth of the prophet Jonah reached the king of Nineveh and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, sat in ashes, and he issued a proclamation and published it through Nineveh.
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By the decree of the king and his nobles, let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything, let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and then let them call out mightily to God.
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Let everyone turn from his evil and from the violence in his hands.
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Who knows, God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger so that we may not perish.
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Isn't their story ours? It's the same. Whether you be a
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Minnesotan or a Ninevite, it's all the same. God's word has reached us and called to us and told us that we need to repent of our sins, to turn from our wicked ways, to cry out to God for mercy.
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Who knows, maybe God will relent and turn from his fierce anger so that we may not perish.
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But here's the thing. This is where the gospel enters in and we see it so clearly.
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You'll note that when it came to Jesus Christ, the very son of God, who, although he was by God in nature, he did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped.
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He humbled himself, was born of the Virgin Mary and he was obedient even to the point of death, even death on the cross.
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Why? Because God, his wrath, didn't turn away from Jesus.
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God laid on Jesus the iniquity of us all and Jesus went to the cross and hung naked, bleeding, dying, having been scourged there in the darkness, hanging from the cross, struggling to breathe.
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With each languishing breath, he experienced the full fury of God's wrath.
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It didn't turn away from Jesus on that day so that it might turn away from us.
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That's the point of the cross. God's fierce anger didn't turn away from Christ.
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He bore your sins and my sins in his body on the tree and he suffered for our sins.
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In fact, experience God's anger and wrath. God the Father himself turning away from the
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Son so that we would not perish. This is why God is able to relent of the disaster he's threatened for all of us.
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It says this, when God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said that he would do to them and he did not do it.
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Boy, did that make Jonah mad. He was really upset. In fact, Jonah went and had an adult temper tantrum and was legitimately just scolding
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God, saying, is this not what I told you? Is this not why I went to Tarshish and turned away?
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Because I knew, what did he know? He knew that God was gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and that God relents over disaster.
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Jonah didn't want to have to spend eternity with a bunch of forgiven Ninevites.
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Man, even God's prophets need to be forgiven, right?
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But that's kind of the point Jesus himself affirms when he condemns the Pharisees and the scribes and the people of his age who didn't repent at his preaching.
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He said that the men of Nineveh would rise up on the day of judgment and condemn Jesus' generation for not repenting.
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Christ affirms that these Ninevites are saved and that he not only relented of the disaster of overturning
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Nineveh at that time, he relented of the disaster of the second death for these
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Ninevites. So brothers and sisters, though your sins be as scarlet, Christ has bled and died for you and he clothes you and makes you white as snow.
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God is gracious, he is merciful, he is slow to anger, he is abounding in steadfast love and he relents over disaster for us because that disaster fell on Christ so that you and I can be forgiven and pardoned.
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So listen to the end of our Old Testament text. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering.
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I can't hear those words without hearing about the Lord's Supper. Ah, Christ has bled and died for our sins.
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God has relented of the disaster and he has left us bread and wine, his body and blood given in shed for the forgiveness of our sins.
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So blow the trumpet in Zion, consecrate the fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the people.
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That's what we've done here tonight, this Ash Wednesday. We've called a solemn assembly and you know, we have even little ones here and that's the way it should be.
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We love the fact that we have small kids here on an Ash Wednesday service. Yes! Gather the children, even the infants.
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Let the bridegroom leave his room, the bride her chamber. Between the vestibule and the altar, let the priests and the ministers of the
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Lord weep and say, spare your people, oh Lord, and make not your heritage a reproach and a byword among the nations.
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Why should they say among the peoples, where is their God? And of course, having seen his people repent, turn from their wickedness, cry out to him for mercy, what is
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God's response when that happens? It's not the same as my mother's, thank God. Yeah, when
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I go and apologize to my mother, I'm sorry mom, I was wrong. You bet you were wrong. That's not the right response, by the way.
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No, you don't get a scolding after you confess. What does God do? The Lord became jealous for his land.
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And he had people, pity on his people. And that's God for us. He definitely is jealous for us now.
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He's had pity on us. So the Lord answered and said, behold, I am sending you grain, wine, and oil.
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You will be satisfied and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.
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Brothers and sisters, Lent is so precious. Repentance is the daily life of us as Christians.
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So as we draw near to Christ's crucifixion on Good Friday, let us embrace this
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Lenten tide. Let us embrace fasting and praying and devotion and self -denial.
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These are good things as we reflect upon our sin. And let us, again, by the power of the
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Holy Spirit, cry out to God to have mercy on us and trust confidently in his forgiveness and kindness because it is absolutely true.
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God is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, pardoning iniquity, and all of those things because that's what
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Christ, that's what God is really like. And let us cast aside our sin, which so easily entangles us and mars our course.
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And let us press forward into the eternity that God has laid out for us and given us as a gift in Christ.
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That's what the Lenten season is about. I have nothing more to say about it.
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In the name of Jesus, amen. Congregation, please rise for the canticle.
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Let my prayer rise before you as incense. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
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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.
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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.
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Amen. The Lord be with you.
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Let us pray. Let us pray for the whole
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Church of God and Christ Jesus and for all people according to their needs. Have mercy on us,
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O God, according to your steadfast love. In your abundant mercy, blot out our transgressions for the sake of your
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Son, Jesus Christ, who was crucified for our sins and raised for our justification.
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Preserve the proclamation of his cross among us and guard your church from any false teaching that might delight our desires, but leave us lost in our iniquity.
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Lord, in your mercy, look graciously on your church and preserve the gospel among us.
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Renew us in this penitential season to strive against the desires of the flesh, to grow in the joy of your salvation and to look in love and service toward our neighbors, especially those of the household of faith.
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Lord, in your mercy, look graciously on the families of our congregation, defend your holiest state of marriage against every enemy that would divide, strengthen parents for their duties, especially bringing up their children in the fear and instruction of the
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Lord, and preserve us all faithful to the end. Lord, in your mercy, remember in mercy all who bear office in our land, give them wisdom, protect them from danger, and help them serve our people according to your gracious will.
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Help us to become a people that guards the rights of the weakest and most vulnerable, especially the unborn.
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Lord, in your mercy, behold in mercy all who are sick, who suffer and who rejoice.
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Be with all expectant mothers, all whose work is dangerous, the unemployed, those near death, and those who mourn.
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Comfort us who are dust and must return to dust with a promise that a broken and contrite heart you will not despise.
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Lord, in your mercy. Bless us, Heavenly Father, on this holy day of repentance.
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As we enter the season of Lent, let us hold fast to your word. Teach us to die to self and serve you faithfully throughout this mortal life until at last you bring us with the blessed saints into your presence forevermore.
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Through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
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Amen. O God, from whom come all holy desires, all good counsels, and all just works.
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Give to us, your servants, that peace which the world cannot give, that our hearts may be set to obey your commandments, and also that we, being defended from the fear of our enemies, may live in peace and quietness.
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Through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the Holy Spirit, one
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God, now and forever. Amen.
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Let us bless the Lord. The grace of our
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Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the
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Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.