Lent 5 March 17, 2024 Bulletin

THE FIFTH SUNDAY IN LENT

Passion Sunday

March 17, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTION.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS

Today marks the beginning of Passiontide in our church calendar, which comprises the final two weeks of Lent leading up to Easter. Our Scripture lessons for today set the “tone” for the season, setting forth something  of what the sacrificial death of  Christ on the Cross is, and  how the Cross of Christ provides us with the model and pattern for our own lives. The Epistle lesson from Hebrews speaks to us of what Christ has done for us. He is the mediator of the new covenant, that by means of death, we are set free from our sins, our consciences are purified by means of forgiveness, and we receive the promise of an eternal inheritance. Christ has done something for us, once and for all, which we could not do, but can only faithfully and thankfully receive. But the sacrifice of Christ is not just something that was done for us. It is something that must be done in us and through us, transforming our minds and hearts, and ultimately our lives, day by day. This is precisely the message of our Gospel lesson for today where in place of the pursuit of worldly ambition, power, and status, Christ calls his disciples to take His attitude of humble obedience, and make it their own. 

Hebrews 9:11-16

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Lent 5 March 17, 2024 Holy Communion

Use this live stream player to join us LIVE on Sunday morning at 10:30 AM CST.
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THE FIFTH SUNDAY IN LENT
Commonly called Passion Sunday

March 17, 2024

Organ Prelude: Reflection – Kerry J. Beaumont (b. 1957)

HYMN: # 541 As Longs the Hart for Flowing Streams

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Lent 4 March 10, 2024 Bulletin

THE FOURTH SUNDAY IN LENT

March 10, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

In the Sunday Eucharistic lections in The Book of Common Prayer, the season of Lent is understood as pilgrimage of the soul. It is a hazardous journey through a spiritual wilderness of demonic trials and temptations that separate us from the true and living God, and hold us in bondage and captivity.  The first three Sundays of Lent have been all about how it is that Christ liberates us from the deceptions and power of the Evil One. On this the Fourth Sunday in Lent, the Church holds before us the goal and end of our journey. IN our Epistle reading from Galatians, St. Paul refers to “Jerusalem which is above is free and is the mother of us all.”  In symbolic terms, Jerusalem is our spiritual home, a place of freedom and peace where we  enjoy union and communion with God in  a fellowship of love.   Such also is the parish Church, the earthly counterpart of the heavenly city, which brings us to birth through the waters of baptism, and like a good mother, nourishes us through Word and Sacrament and guides us in our way. The Gospel lesson relates the story of Christ’s  feeding of the 5,000 in the  wilderness with 5 loaves and two fish, which is for us an image of the Eucharist, where our “bodies and souls are preserved unto eternal life”, and where we are refreshed and given the strength we need  to continue the journey home.

THE LESSON:  Galatians 4:26-31

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Lent 3 March 3, 2024 Bulletin

THE THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT

March 3, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS

Lent is a season in which we are confronted with the reality of “ spiritual warfare,” that is  our battle with the demons, which is to be interpreted  not merely in a reductionist  psychological sense, but in an actual spiritual sense of demons aactual “ malignant intelligences” and “ evil powers” that impact our lives and seek “to corrupt and destroy the creatures of God.” ( Book of Alternative Services p. 154) Our Gospel lesson today portrays Christ as the one who through the finger (power) of God casts out demons and overpowers Satan. In baptism, when we renounced “ the world, the flesh, and the devil” and united ourselves to Jesus in His death and Resurrection,  we became partakers of Christ’s victory over sin, death, and the devil, and the house of souls was swept clean. But as we see in the parable which Christ tells, unless we continue in repentance and acquire  thevirtues, the house of our souls remain vulnerable to demonic attack. In our Epistle lesson St. Paul unpacks Christ’s teachingwarning us to be especially on guard against the demons of sexual sin, covetousness, and idolatry.

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Lenten Mission 2024

LENTEN MISSION 2024

XIR193456 Sermon on the Mount, Scenes from the Life of Christ (mosaic) by Byzantine School, (6th century) mosaic Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna, Italy Giraudon out of copyright

Blessed are You: Living the Beatitudes

Guest Speaker: Dr. John Patrick,
President and Professor of the History of Science, Medicine and Faith
Augustine College, Ottawa

February 23 – 25

Friday and Saturday at 7:00 p.m.

Blessed Are You Session 1
Blessed Are You Session 2

Sunday at 10.30 a.m.

Blessed Are You Session 3 / Lent 2 Communion

PUBLIC LECTURE with Dr. John Patrick: “What Hyppocrates Knew and The Practice of Medicine in the Modern Age.” The loss of transcendent values and religious faith in the modern age has had  a profound effect on the practice of medicine  for physicians and patients alike. What role, if any, does faith play in the practice of medicine, and what does Hippocrates, the “Father of Medicine” have to teach us?   Saturday, February 24 10.30 a.m.

(Sorry, but we have only a partial recording of this lecture…)

What Hippocrates Knew and The Practice of Medicine in the Modern Age (Partial recording)

Lent 2 February 25, 2024 Bulletin

THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

February 25, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

THE LESSON:  1 Thessalonians 4:1-8

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Lent 1 February 18, 2024 Bulletin

THE FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT

February 18, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

The Gospel lesson for this First Sunday in Lent presents us with the story of the temptation of Christ in the wilderness, which is of great importance for the pilgrimage of faith that is ours in the season of Lent, and extends throughout our lives. We are a party to and participants in a cosmic conflict between God and His Christ, on the one hand, and the devil, on the other.  There are temptations to be faced, and choices to be made. The Good News is that Jesus Christ has unmaskedexposed and defeated the devil at the point of temptation, and shares His victory with us. It’s why in our Epistle lesson for today St. Paul exhorts us not to accept the grace of God in vain,  but to see the rough and tumble of life as the occasion for the proving of our faith and the faithfulness of God.

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