The Lord’s Day

April 26, 2009

 

The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our stronghold.

(Psalm 46:11)

 

Prelude

 

Apostolic Greeting

 

*Call to Worship Psalm 100

Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth.

Serve the Lord with gladness;

Come before Him with joyful singing.

Know that the Lord Himself is God;

It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;

We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.

Give thanks to Him, bless His name.

For the Lord is good; His lovingkindness is everlasting

And His faithfulness to all generations.

 

*Gloria Patri        No. 734

 

*Prayer of Invocation

 

*Hymn   Before Jehovah’s Awesome Throne   No. 65

 

Public Confession

O Lord, please forgive the thoughts we have had that were formed in malice instead of kindness. Forgive the words we have spoken that revealed hardness of heart instead of gentleness. And forgive our conduct that was contrary to Your holy will. This we ask in Christ’s name.

 

  Words of Comfort and Assurance   Isaiah 55:6, 7

Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.

 

Response  Thou Art the Way   (facing page)

 

Prayer for the Tithe and Offerings

 

Collection of the Tithe and Offerings

 

*Doxology           No. 731

 

*Declaring Our Faith[†]      The Recovery of Fallen Man

How did God respond to fallen man’s condition?

We believe that our good God, by His marvelous wisdom and goodness, seeing that man had plunged himself into both physical and spiritual death and made himself completely miserable, set out to find him, though man, trembling all over, was fleeing from Him.

What promise did God make to fallen man?

He comforted him and promised to give him His Son, “born of a woman,” to crush the head of the serpent, and to make him blessed.

 

Pastoral Prayer

 

*Responsive Reading  Psalm 37:16–22

Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked.

For the arms of the wicked will be broken, but the Lord sustains the righteous.

The Lord knows the days of the blameless,

And their inheritance will be forever.

They will not be ashamed in the time of evil,

And in the days of famine they will have abundance.

But the wicked will perish;

And the enemies of the Lord will be like the glory of the pastures, they vanish—like smoke they vanish away.

The wicked borrows and does not pay back,

But the righteous is gracious and gives.

For those blessed by Him will inherit the land,

But those cursed by Him will be cut off.

 

*Hymn   Blessed Are the Sons of God No. 526

 

*Public Reading of the Word  1 John 3

 

*Prayer for the Ministry of the Word

 

Sermon    Life After the Resurrection   Col. 3:111 (pt. 2)

 

  Hymn   Let Thy Blood in Mercy Poured   No. 429

 

  Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper+

 

*Hymn   And Can It Be That I Should Gain   No. 455

 

*Benediction

 

*Threefold Amen       No. 740

* Congregation will please stand

+ Visitors: please see the note on the back of this bulletin



[†] Based on The Belgic Confession (edited for use in the worship bulletin)