:: Download the 2.22.2015 Worship Study Guide and Sermon Notes
:: Download the 2.22.2015 Bulletin
:: Download the 2.22.2015 Sermon Audio
image :: Etching: Poems of W.B. Yeats, Richard Diebenkorn (1990)
Preparation for Worship :: Follow
“Just as character can only be truly rendered in narrative form, so the answer to the question ‘Who am I?’ can only be given if we ask ‘What’s my story?’ and that can only be answered if there is an answer to the further question, ‘What is the whole story of which my story is a part?’” (Lesslie Newbigin)
Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs for February 22 include ::
:: Praise to the Lord the Almighty (Joachim Neander, 1680) CHART [bandcamp track=2701349241 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]
:: Doxology (Thomas Ken, 1709) CHART [bandcamp track=2257784892 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]
:: Jesus, I my Cross Have Taken (Henry Lyte, 1825) CHART [bandcamp track=1380076138 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]
:: All The Way My Savior Leads Me (Fanny Crosby, 1875) CHART // audio
Call to Worship :: Psalm 9:1-2,11
I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will recount all of Your wonderful deeds. I will be glad and exult in You; I will sing praise to Your name, O Most High. Sing praises to the LORD, who sits enthroned in Zion! Tell among the peoples His deeds!
Gospel Reading :: Luke 9:57-62
As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Sermon :: I Kings 19:19-21
19 So he departed from there and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen in front of him, and he was with the twelfth. Elijah passed by him and cast his cloak upon him. 20 And he left the oxen and ran after Elijah and said, “Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.” And he said to him, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?” 21 And he returned from following him and took the yoke of oxen and sacrificed them and boiled their flesh with the yokes of the oxen and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he arose and went after Elijah and assisted him.
Prayer of Confession
Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mark 1:14-15)
Merciful God, we have sinned in what we have thought and said, in the wrong we have done, and in the good we have not done. You proclaimed the Gospel of God, but we have been slow to repent; forgive our cold hearts. You said the Kingdom was at hand, but we have been slow to trust; forgive our unbelief. You called us to follow You, but we are given to our own way; forgive our rebel lusts. Forgive us, for our Savior Christ’s sake, and renew our lives to the glory of Your name. Amen.
Words of Encouragement :: II Corinthians 5:21
God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.