Prelude – Be Thou My Vision
Greeting and Welcome
Lighting of the Candles
Hymn of Invocation – Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing (LSB 686)
Come, Thou Fount of ev’ry blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
While the hope of endless glory
Fills my heart with joy and love,
Teach me ever to adore Thee;
May I still Thy goodness prove.
Oh, to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be;
Let that grace now like a fetter
Bind my wand’ring heart to Thee:
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it;
Prone to leave the God I love.
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.
+ Preparation +
Invocation
P: In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
C: Amen.
Opening Sentences – Psalm 80:1, 14–15, 7
P: Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, You who lead Joseph like a flock!
C: You who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth.
P: Turn again, O God of hosts!
C: Look down from heaven, and see; have regard for this vine, the stock that Your right hand planted.
P: Restore us, O God of hosts;
C: let Your face shine, that we may be saved!
Confession and Absolution
P: O God our Father, since You have set forth the way of life for us in Your beloved Son, we confess with shame our slowness to learn of Him, our failure to follow His guidance, and our reluctance to bear the cross. We acknowledge that we are by nature sinful and unclean and know in our hearts that we have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed.
C: Have mercy on us and forgive us, O Lord.
P: Forgive us for all that is amiss in our lives, as we continually break Your commands. Forgive us that we have not always been fruitful plantings in Your vineyard.
C: Have mercy on us and forgive us, O Lord.
P: Upon this your confession and by the command of our Lord, I, a called and ordained servant of Christ, forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
C: Amen.
P: May the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, and He will do it.
C: Amen.
+ Word +
First Reading – Deuteronomy 28:1-19
“And if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the Lord your God. Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
“The Lord will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways. The Lord will command the blessing on you in your barns and in all that you undertake. And he will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. The Lord will establish you as a people holy to himself, as he has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in his ways. And all the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they shall be afraid of you. And the Lord will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb and in the fruit of your livestock and in the fruit of your ground, within the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give you. The Lord will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. And the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down, if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you today, being careful to do them, and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
“But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field. Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock. Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
P: This is the Word of the Lord.
C: Thanks be to God.
Epistle – Philippians 3:4b-14
If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
P: This is the Word of the Lord.
C: Thanks be to God.
Holy Gospel – Matthew 21:33-46
P: The Holy Gospel according to St. Matthew, the twenty-first chapter.
C: Glory to You, O Lord.
“Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country. When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit. And the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the first. And they did the same to them. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”
Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’? Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits. And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because they held him to be a prophet.
P: This is the Gospel of the Lord.
C: Praise to You, O Christ.
Children’s Song – Praise God, from Whom All Blessings Flow (LSB 805)
Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;
Praise Him, all creatures here below;
Praise Him above, ye heav’nly host:
Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
Children’s Message
Hymn of the Day – I Am Forever Who I Am
Though mountains slide into the sea,
And waters rush where fields should be,
Though monuments and nations fall,
Your holy city stands through all.
When nothing seems to stay the same,
You teach us your eternal name. Refrain
Refrain: I Am forever who I Am. Above you, beneath you,
Around you and within you. Be still and know that I Am God.
We buy and sell, we lose or gain;
Our fortunes shift like sun and rain.
Sustain our lives, reward our toil
With bread and honey, wine and oil.
Save us and others from our greed;
You always give us what we need. Refrain
Each generation looks for truth,
And doubt can trouble age or youth.
If other gods would take your place
Remember us with love and grace.
Reclaim us if we go astray;
You are the Truth, the Life, the Way. Refrain
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