:: Download the 8.20.2017 Worship Study Guide and Sermon Notes
:: Download the 8.20.2017 Bulletin
:: Download the 8.20.2017 Sermon
image :: The Jews in the Desert, Tintoretto (1593, Italian)
Preparation for Worship on August 20 2017 :: In The Wilderness
“Lord, lead me through the wilderness,
I am a poor pilgrim
I don’t have strength or life in me,
I am lying in the grave.
Omnipotent is the One who brings me to the shore.” (William Williams, 1745)
“The story of the book of Numbers is written to a people whose lives are lived between the accomplishing of their redemption and its consummation, between the exodus and the Promised Land. The Lord has done what He promised Abraham in bringing his descendants out of their bondage – but He has not yet brought them into the Promised Land. They live in between the times, and their present experience is not one of the fullness of salvation but rather of the wilderness along the way.” (Iain Duguid)
Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs for August 20 include ::
:: Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer (William Williams, 1762) CHART [bandcamp track=3508672184 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]:: Be Thou My Vision (8th Century Irish Hymn) CHART [bandcamp track=1801427840 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]:: On Jordan’s Stormy Banks (Samuel Stennett, 1787) CHART [bandcamp track=1174694383 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]:: How Great Is Our God (Tomlin, Reeves & Cash, 2004) CHART [bandcamp track=1043846454 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]:: Doxology (Thomas Ken, 1709) CHART [bandcamp track=2257784892 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short]
Call to Worship :: Psalm 105:1-2, 7, 11-13
Oh give thanks to the Lord; call upon His name;
make known His deeds among the peoples!
Sing to Him, sing praises to Him;
tell of all his wondrous works!
He is the Lord our God… saying
“To you I will give the land of Canaan
as your portion for an inheritance.”
They were few in number,
of little account, and sojourners in it,
wandering from nation to nation,
from one kingdom to another people.
Confession of Sin :: Jeremiah 2:11-13 & Psalm 79:5,8-9
Has a nation changed its gods,
even though they are no gods?
But My people have changed their glory
for that which does not profit.
Be appalled, O heavens, at this;
be shocked, be utterly desolate,
declares the Lord,
for My people have committed two evils:
they have forsaken Me,
the Fountain of Living Waters,
and hewed out cisterns for themselves,
broken cisterns that can hold no water.
How long, O Lord? Will You be angry forever?
Will Your jealousy burn like fire?
Do not remember against us our former iniquities;
let Your compassion come speedily to meet us,
for we are brought very low.
Help us, O God of our salvation,
Words of Encouragement :: Colossians 1:12-13
Give thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
New Testament Reading :: I Corinthians 10:11-13
For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and all ate the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness.
Sermon :: Numbers 1:1-4
1 The Lord spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tent of meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they had come out of the land of Egypt, saying, 2 “Take a census of all the congregation of the people of Israel, by clans, by fathers’ houses, according to the number of names, every male, head by head. 3 From twenty years old and upward, all in Israel who are able to go to war, you and Aaron shall list them, company by company. 4 And there shall be with you a man from each tribe, each man being the head of the house of his fathers.”