Service for 3rd Sunday of Easter

                                                     10:30 a.m., April 26, 2009

 

                                                  GATHER IN GOD’S NAME

 

OPENING SENTENCES                                                                                    from John 20:29

               After being raised, Jesus met the disciples and said:  “Thus it is written,

that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day,

and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name

to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.  You are witnesses to these things….”

            As disciples, we are witnesses.

 

                                                        Variations on Madrid                                       M. Helman

               (Commissioned for the 25th Anniversary of the Overbrook Belles 1999)

 

WELCOME, REGISTRATION & ANNOUNCEMENTS

 

CHORAL INTROIT & LIGHTING THE CHRIST CANDLE

 

*CALL TO WORSHIP

               Who are you?

                 I am a disciple among disciples, a child of God in God’s world.

            Who will you be?

                 I don’t know, though God knows.

            When will you know?

                 Now I can see only dimly.

     I will know when I am fully known, in God’s company face to face.

 

*PROCESSIONAL HYMN # 376                                      Love Divine, All Loves Excelling

 

*AFFIRMATION OF FAITH                                                        from A Brief Statement of Faith

 

               We trust in Jesus Christ, fully human, fully God.

                 Jesus proclaimed the reign of God:

                        preaching good news to the poor

                        and release to the captives,

                        teaching by word and deed

                        and blessing the children,

                        eating with outcasts, forgiving sinners

                        and calling all to repent and believe.

                 Unjustly condemned for blasphemy and sedition, Jesus was crucified,

                        suffering the depths of human pain

                        and giving his life for the sins of the world,

                        vindicating his sinless life,

                        breaking the power of sin and evil,

                        delivering us from death to life eternal.

            We trust in Jesus Christ, fully human, fully God.

 

*THE PEACE

 

            The peace of the One we trust be with you all.

                 Peace be with you.

           (worshipers greet one another with words and gestures of the peace of Christ)

 

                                                  PROCLAIM GOD’S WORD

 

THE LETTER                                                                                         1 John 3: 1-7(NRSV)

                                                                                               Pew Bible New Testament p. 225

 

ANTHEM                                              I Surrender All                                     arr. M. Hogan

 

MOMENT WITH THE YOUNG

 

THE GOSPEL                                                                                Luke 24: 36b – 48 (NRSV)

 

SERMON                                                                                       “’…anything here to eat?’”

 

                                                RESPOND TO GOD’S WORD

 

OFFERING OURSELVES TO GOD’S PURPOSES

            Call to Respond

               OFFERTORY             The Trumpet in the Morning                            arr. D. Wagner

                *RESPONSE # 592                                  Praise God, from Whom All Blessings Flow

 

PRAYERS THANKING AND ASKING GOD, THE LORD’S PRAYER     Hymnal p. 16

 

                                             GO TO SERVE IN GOD’S NAME

 

*HYMN # 115                                                                  Come, Ye Faithful, Raise the Strain

 

*CHARGE                                                                                                                                       1 John 3:2-3

               Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed.

            What we do know is this:

                 When he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.

            And all who have this hope in him purify themselves; just as he is pure.

 

                 We live in him forming ourselves in his likeness.

 

*BLESSING

 

POSTLUDE                            Fantasia on “Madrid” (Allegro)                               J. Weaver

                   (Note that some will be seated and others depart in joy and silence.)

 

 

                            WE ARE A STEPHEN MINISTRY CONGREGATION

 

                                                       WORSHIP LEADERS

Liturgists

Jane Leemhuis, Rev. Jonathan Siehl

Sermon

William R. Leety

Moment with the Young

Hope Boring

Musical Leadership

Chancel Chimes

Chancel Choir

Sarah Shaffer, Choirmaster

Nancy Deeth, Organ/Piano

Head Usher

Dick Dull

 
 
                                                 IN MEMORIAM
 
                                                          Margaret D. Hixson
                                                 May 4, 1918   ~  April 21, 2009
 
                                                “I am the resurrection and the life.
                                Those who believe in me, though they die, will live.”
                                                                 -John 11:25