Open Arms Worship Service, March 22, 2020

Divine Service for Online Worship

Fourth Sunday in Lent

March 22, 2020

Welcome to our first online worship service!  

If you would like to listen to the music tracks, please click on the links below.  If you would like to follow along and participate in the liturgy, please follow instructions below and speak the bold text sections.

I pray God will bless your worship today, as you receive His gifts of forgiveness for your sins and encouragement from His Word.   

Opening Songs:     God of Calvary 

Worship Service:  worship service video   

Invocation

V:    In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

C:    AMEN

Call to Worship     from Psalm 142

V:    With my voice I cry out to the LORD;

C:    with my voice I plead for mercy to the LORD.

V:    I pour out my complaint before Him;

C:    I tell my trouble before Him.

V:    I cry to you, O LORD;

C:    I say, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.”

Confession and Absolution

V:    Children of God, though we are separated today by time and space we come together as one family.  Each of us is coming from broken and sinful lives.  We live in the darkness of the world around us, and are blind to His will and ways.  Yet God calls us to confess our sins.  We ask His forgiveness in the Name of Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Silent confession of your sins

V:    God of God, Light of Light…

C:    we confess that by nature we are sinful and unclean, born in darkness.  We are often blind to Your Word.  We are often blind to Your work in our lives.  We sin against You, and against one another in thought, word, and deed.  For the sake of Jesus, who is the light of the world, forgive me all my sins, that my eyes may be opened to look to You in faith and hope.

V:    Almighty God, in His mercy has given His Son to die for you and for His sake forgives you all your sins.  Through His death on the cross, Jesus Christ has shined His eternal light of forgiveness, peace, and life on you.  Your heavenly Father has forgiven your sins, in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

C:    Amen. 

Prayer

V:    Let us pray…  

C:    Amen.

Old Testament Reading               Isaiah 42:14-21

For a long time I have held my peace;

I have kept still and restrained myself;

now I will cry out like a woman in labor;

I will gasp and pant.

I will lay waste mountains and hills,

and dry up all their vegetation;

I will turn the rivers into islands,

and dry up the pools.

And I will lead the blind

in a way that they do not know,

in paths that they have not known

I will guide them.

I will turn the darkness before them into light,

the rough places into level ground.

These are the things I do,

and I do not forsake them.

They are turned back and utterly put to shame,

who trust in carved idols,

who say to metal images,

“You are our gods.”

Hear, you deaf,

and look, you blind, that you may see!

Who is blind but my servant,

or deaf as my messenger whom I send?

Who is blind as my dedicated one,

or blind as the servant of the Lord?

He sees many things, but does not observe them;

his ears are open, but he does not hear.

The Lord was pleased, for his righteousness’ sake,

              to magnify his law and make it glorious.

                    

A:    This is the Word of the Lord.

C:    Thanks be to God.

Epistle Reading                                Ephesians 5:8-14

…for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord.  Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.  For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret.  But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says,

“Awake, O sleeper,

      and arise from the dead,

          and Christ will shine on you.”

A:    This is the Word of the Lord.

C:    Thanks be to God.

Holy Gospel                                        Mark 1:40-45

V:    The Holy Gospel according to St. Mark, the 1^st chapter.

C:    Glory to You, O Lord.

 And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean.”  Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, “I will; be clean.”  And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean.  And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once, and said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, for a proof to them.”  But he went out and began to talk freely about it, and to spread the news, so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places, and people were coming to him from every quarter.

V:    This is the Word of the Lord.

C:    Praise to You, O Christ.

Sermon

The Nicene Creed 

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made; who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried. And the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures and ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father. And He will come again with glory to judge both the living and the dead, whose kingdom will have no end.

And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spoke by the prophets. And I believe in one holy Christian and apostolic Church, I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins, and I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.

Prayers of the Church

V:    Let’s pray for all people, and for all their needs.

The Lord’s Prayer  

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in 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, for ever and ever.  Amen.

Benediction

Closing Song:  How Great Is Your Love