An Issues Etc. Series On The Historic Liturgy: Session 1 - Introduction

An Issues Etc.
Series on the Historic Liturgy

With Pr. Will Weedon Director of Worship for the Lutheran Church-Missouri
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Session 1 Introduction
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/issuesetc.org/podcast/10090510122.mp3
True Worship
Sound bite played of Rick Warren . He says worship is not for our benefit but to
bring pleasure to God.
Is this statement correct? No. Worship is not an M but a W. M worship is what
Rick Warren describes. M starts on the bottom and goes up and then back down
and then back up and finally ends back down. So it starts on the bottom with me
giving something to God. Then God responds to me. This kind of worship is
essentially idolatry. This is the exact opposite of real worship.
True worship (W worship) starts on top with God. As an illustration think about the
Lords Supper. God first gives us grain and grapes. From these gifts from God we
make bread and wine and give them to God. He then takes the bread and wine and
through his Word and in, with, and under the bread and wine he gives us the body
and blood of Jesus. We receive these gifts and give back to God thanksgiving. This is
the rhythm of true worship. It always originates from God, is for our benefit, and
ends with God.
The true Christian faith is one where God the Father loves us so much that he sent
his only Son. The Son loves us so much that he sent His Spirit. The Spirit loved us so
much that he gave us faith in Jesus. And Jesus presents us clothed in his
righteousness to the Father. Christian worship always starts with God and all the
good gifts he has for us. Foundationally, worship is God giving and us receiving. And
worship always ends with our thanksgiving to God for all the gifts he has given.
Note that even the ability to thank and praise God is a gift of God.
Many Christians worship as though Jesus is not present or, if he is present, its only
in spirit. They worship an absent Jesus. But in true worship we are gathered into his
real presence with all the saints and angels. We worship with all of the saints in
heaven and on earth. It is an awesome thing which we approach with reverence.
This is an unseen reality.
Defining Historic Liturgy

What is liturgy? First of all liturgy is NOT the work of the people as some say. Liturgy
is work done [by God] for the people. Jesus is the primary liturgist. He does the
liturgy for the people. In the liturgy Jesus gives out his gifts to the people. Jesus
gathers his people together in order that he might give them his gifts. The liturgy is
the place where we live as the people of God. (Dr. Norman Nagel) The liturgy is
the place where Jesus dishes out his gifts.
An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy

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How is the liturgy historic? The liturgy is an ordered action that has occurred across
time and culture. No matter what the time or culture in the Divine Service Jesus has
always given out his gifts in the same way. There is a pattern that has been followed
throughout history and it comes right out of the scriptures.
Where do we see this pattern established in Holy Scripture? Lets first look right
after Jesus resurrection. The resurrection is of course a turning point in history. So
lets look at Luke 24. After Jesus has been resurrected, he joins two disciples who
are walking along the road as they travel back to their home in Emmaus. They are
sad because of Jesus death. When Jesus joins them, they dont know its him. Then
Jesus explains to them from the scriptures how the Messiah had to die and rise
again. As he explained these things and opened the scriptures to them, their hearts
burned within them. When they reached their home, they invite Jesus to stay with
them. Jesus then took on the role of the host. He took the bread, gave thanks, and
broke the bread. Suddenly they knew who Jesus was and Jesus disappeared. Then
they ran back to Jerusalem as witnesses to Jesus resurrection.
So here we have the basic pattern of the Divine Service. The scriptures were opened
and proclaimed, and they revealed Christs death and resurrection for the
forgiveness of sins. And then there was the breaking of the bread, the recognition of
Christ with them, and the going forth as witnesses. This gives us the very basic
order of the Divine Service. First there was the Service of the Word, the reading and
preaching of the scriptures [which are about Jesus]. And then there was the
reception of the Sacrament [where Jesus gives us himself]. This is a constant in the
life of the church, century after century. If you read Justin Martyr of the second
century, you will see that the liturgy they used is very similar to the liturgy we use
today. It was founded in the Emmaus account and it continues to this very day.
Another ancient document called the Didache shows how from the very first years
after Christ this pattern existed. This isnt to say that every detail of worship was
spelled out and there was no variation. There were many liturgies but most followed
the basic pattern laid out in Luke 24.
Myths about Early Christian Worship
Myth #1: Early Christians worshipped in a very free-form way. The record of the NT
and other historical documents shows that this was not true. Paul says worship
should be done in good order. That is what the pattern that Jesus provides good
order a way to worship. The order of worship begins with us listening to God
talking to us. This order is also reflected in Act 2:42. They devoted themselves to
the apostles doctrine and to the fellowship of the breaking of bread and to the
prayers (this refers to prayers at set times of the day the liturgy of time).

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Myth #2: The liturgy is a product of Roman Catholicism. Many other ancient
Christians worshipped following the liturgy just as the Catholics did. The same
structure has existed from the time of Jesus until now throughout all of
Christendom.
Along similar lines, based on our Lutheran background, there is a myth that the
liturgy is a German thing that we refuse to get rid of. Actually there are a lot of
things in the liturgy that came from the Episcopal church. For example the classic
setting for Glory Be to God on High is a Scotch tune that uses a classic Anglican
chant. The Nunc Dimmitis is also an Anglican piece. And, oh by the way, both of
these songs are from the Scriptures. [Most of the Divine Service comes directly from
the Scriptures.] Some say its because the music sounds strange. Yes it is different.
Its not pop music. The Lutheran church across time has taken in forms of music
from every generation. Only the best stand the test of time. Each generation adds
its music to centuries of music accumulated by the church. So its a problem when
centuries of meaningful music is dumped and replaced by whats heard on Christian
radio stations today. Those churches that do that are impoverishing their
congregations. Many of the hymns in the hymn book have been used for centuries
because they are packed with such depth. It is a tragedy when people dont have
the great hymns of our church. Hymns may bear the marks of the culture it
developed in, but those that last through the ages speak to other generations and
cultures as well.
What the Liturgy Does
There are things in worship that are neither commanded nor forbidden (called
adiaphora). The old Adam wants to do what it wants, when it wants, and how it
wants. Liturgy curbs the old Adam. Liturgy is about receiving a shared inheritance
that is good for us and not just doing our own thing in our own way.
The liturgy also protects the congregation from the whims of the pastor. Pastors
sometimes have their own hobby-horses. In the liturgy we worship as Christians
have done for centuries. In the liturgy we receive the gifts that Christ gives out. The
liturgy keeps the focus on Christ where it should belong.
A Question About Songs
A question from a listener: Should we only sing songs from the Bible like the
Psalms? The church has always recognized that the songs we sing [while based on
Gods word] are our response to God in our own words. Whenever sinful man is
involved there is always a risk of introducing error. But we overflow with joy and so
we take the risk. One thing man-made songs can do is take various parts of the
Scriptures and tie them altogether like bouquet of scripture verses. Note too that
there is a difference between the church producing its own songs versus the church

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borrowing music from the music industry. After all, it is an industry and its main goal
as an industry is to make money. And the word of God can be very offensive
[especially Gods Law] so the music industry doesnt include this because it will not
sell. Our sinful nature would rather be affirmed than slain. The music industry does
not want to put out music that is offensive. The church sings the truth.
Uniformity
Uniformity in ceremony is not necessary for unity in the faith, but it sure is helpful.
You can strive for uniformity but with flexibility within parameters. Uniformity helps
provide order. When one walks in to McDonalds anywhere in the USA, one knows
what to expect on the menu. We should be able to walk into a Lutheran Christian
church and expect the same order, recognizing that this is how God gives out his
good gifts. And the purpose for this order, this uniformity is for the clear
presentation of the Gospel. The liturgy allows the Word of God to dwell among Gods
people with great richness.
How do we respond to someone who says the historic liturgy has been good for the
church for a long time, but now it has outlived its usefulness it doesnt reach this
culture? At this place and time there must be a better way to communicate the
Gospel. The response might be that we really wouldnt know if a new approach is
successful for many, many years. Will this new way survive? We do know that the
historic liturgy has survived not just for many years, but for many centuries, for two
millennia. Because people are sinful there is a natural divisiveness among them.
The liturgy is designed to counter that divisiveness. [Plus, we cant change the way
that God gives out his gifts.]
The liturgy brings with it a sense of reverence. Many of the new forms of worship
have no sense of reverence. If you are in the presence of God there should be
reverence. Reverence is a recognition of the unseen reality of Gods presence and
the amazing gifts that he has for us.
Session 2 Confession
A Jarring Beginning
One of the first things that the historic liturgy begins with is the confession of sins. It
is a rather jarring thing to begin by saying I am a poor miserable sinner. In the
confession we dump out on the table for all to see all of the sins that we normally
hide from our friends. In confession we admit the truth that we are wretched, blind,
lost, and dead. We confess that we not only havent pleased God with our thoughts,
words, and deeds, but we havent really even tried that hard. And even when we

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have tried, we have still failed. Why do we begin the service in this way? That is
what we will be discussing today.
How long have Christians been using this confession of their wretchedness before
God? It goes back a long way. It goes back to the Old Testament. When you come
into the presence of God, the Holy One, you become acutely aware of your sin.
[When we gather in Christs name and begin the service in the name of the triune
God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, holy God is present with us.] The Didache (a first
century document) encourages Christians to begin the Divine Service with a
confession of their faults. The confession started out as more of a private devotion
that people did before the service, but it gradually became an actual part of the
service. At the time of the Lutheran Reformation, the confession tended to be later
in the service, just after the sermon and before Holy Communion. [So the confession
of sins goes back to the OT and was encouraged by early Christians.]
Contrasting the Beginning of Worship Services
Lets contrast the beginning of worship in the historic liturgy with what is today a
popular substitute. Today many churches begin with music that says how much I
love the Lord and how good God is. This second type of opening is basically the
liturgy of the Pentecostal church. Its built upon the idea that you need to give the
congregation an emotional experience and you do it by the medium of music.
In the historic liturgy we begin with the name of God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Wherever Gods name is used by those who gather in his name, there God promises
to be present with them. The very first thing we become aware of when we gather
in the presence of holy God is our sinfulness. We have the same response that
Isaiah had. One day Isaiah had a vision of the Holy One who he served in the
temple. And as soon as he saw God, he cried out, Woe is me! Im a dead man! He
became aware that he, a sinner, was standing before the Holy and Almighty God.
We see something similar in Lk. 5 where Peter realized that Jesus was God. Peter
turned to Jesus and said, Go away Jesus, for I am a sinful man. When we are in the
perfection of Gods presence we quickly become aware of our sin. We are not aware
of our sins when we are not in the presence of the Lord. So when some churches
dont recognize the presence of Jesus in worship, they also will not recognize their
own sinfulness. So this is true of many generic, protestant worship services, where
they believe Jesus is up in heaven. But for those Christians that use the traditional
liturgy, the first thing we recognize when the service begins is that Jesus really is
here in Gods Word and in the Sacrament of Holy Communion.
What role does the confession of sin have in terms of reverence? In most nontraditional worship services there is a lack of reverence. On the other hand,
everything said and done by those who participate in the historic liturgy shows their
belief that they are in the presence of the Holy One. And therefore they show

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reverence toward God. Gods holiness causes terror to the sinner. God is like
electricity. If you reach out and touch him, youre going to sizzle and burn. An
example of this is when they were moving the Ark at the time of David and it tipped
and Uzziah reached out to steady it, when he touched it, he was dead.
The entire OT worship system was set up to protect the people from the presence of
God. Yet it wasnt set up to keep them away from Gods presence. It was set up to
provide a way for God to come to them and be present with them without God
destroying them. Thats key. We are in a catch-22. Only Gods presence gives
eternal life. But Gods presence is death to the sinner. So God himself sets up a way
where he can come and wipe out our sin without wiping out us. Thats what the
entire OT worship system was all about and all of it pointed forward to when God
would come to us in the flesh of Jesus Christ. When God is present among sinful
people, it is like when he was with Israel on Mt. Sinai. That was a scene of thunder
and lightning, fire and earthquake. And the people were terrified to be in Gods holy
presence. God understands that his presence to us sinners is death. Yet, he cannot
tolerate sin of any kind. So the sacrificial system of the OT was a way in which he
could bring life to sinners who are condemned to die without him and who are
destined to die if they come into his presence. Having done away with sin, to the
believer his presence is no longer deadly but brings life and joy.
What Confession Is
In Confession, we simply say to God what he has already said to us, You are a poor,
miserable sinner. Confession means say the same thing. In confession we say
the same thing about ourselves that God has already said; we agree with him.
Likewise, when we confess our faith, we simply say the same thing that God has
revealed about himself and the salvation he has provided. A confession of praise is
simply a recitation of the great things that God has done. So confession of sins is
not us saying, God, I am so sorry for my sins, please forgive me. In confession we
see ourselves as God sees us as sinners. It is speaking the truth of our sinfulness
and the truth of the punishment we deserve for it. It is not about how you feel. Its
about what is the truth. As tainted human beings we can never be as sorry for our
sins as we ought to be. We can never be as sincere as we ought to be. The
appropriate response to the truth of our sinfulness is not so much sorrow, but terror.
By our sin, we deserve Gods punishment here on earth and forever in hell. That is
terrifying.
Some Old Testament Examples of Confession
There are many examples of the confession of sins in the OT. There are a number of
Psalms, called penitential psalms, that illustrate confession. Ps. 32 is quoted in the
liturgy. Ps. 51 is the psalm of Davids confession. In it David is reflecting on the
adultery he committed with Bathsheba. It tears the heart out of you every time you

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pray it. It powerfully says the same thing that God says. In it we pray for a new
heart. Dont fix the old one! Make a new one! When God opens our lips to speak the
truth of our sinfulness, we are praising God. Ps. 130 is also a stunning confession. If
God kept a record of sin, no one could stand. But with God there is forgiveness.
Another striking confession is Dan. 9. When you have time read that whole thing.
Daniel confesses the sin of the nation of Israel to God. He speaks the truth of
Israels sinfulness [which is the reason for their exile] and of Gods righteousness.
Another good example of confession is the confession of Manasseh in 2 Chronicles.
2 Kings portrays Manasseh as a loathsome sinner. In 2 Chronicles Manasseh
repents. And in the Apocrypha there is a wonderful prayer attributed to Manasseh.
Pr. Weedon read part of it to show the brutal honesty of the confession.
What is it about these OT confessions that make them good examples for us to
follow? It is their sweeping nature. They call sin sin. It is their willingness to put
their entire life under the condemnation of God.
New Testament Commands and Promises of Confession
James says to confess your sins to one another. This is as opposed to today where
many would say, I dont have to confess my sins to anyone. I can confess them in
the privacy of my own heart. James says admit the truth of your sins to each other.
That happens preeminently in the Divine Service as we all say it together to God
and to each other. There is also a beautiful promise in Scripture that every Christian
should remember from 1 John. If we confess (say the same thing that God says)
our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all
unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is
not in us. God has said you are altogether sinful and unclean. When we confess, we
are saying this is true just as God said.
But what if someone says he cant remember any sins to confess this week? Its not
that we are confessing specific sins, but that we are confessing that we are sinners.
We are not sinners because we sin. We sin because we are sinners. Gods word says
and we agree that we are my nature sinful and unclean. Some people object and
ask where does that come from? It comes from Eph. 2. There Paul says, We were
by nature children of wrath. This is important. It is not the doing of the sin that
makes us sinners. But the fact that we do the sin shows that we are sinners.
Private Confession and Absolution
The most common way that people experience confession is in the Confession of
the Divine Service. But for a long time this confession wasnt in the service proper.
One example is that you might have a sin that troubles you. God has a place where
you can go to hear a very personal word of absolution. And that is private
confession and absolution. This continued for a long time after the Reformation.

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Lutherans would offer it on Saturday night. But there is a difference between public
confession and private confession. In public confession we confess all of our sins to
God. But in private confession to the pastor, we confess those specific sins that
trouble us.
So in public, corporate confession we confess that we are sinners, but in private
confession we confess specific sins. Over the last few decades people have played
around with and changed the liturgy. And one of the things they have done is to try
and add specific sins to the confession which may or may not apply to everyone.
They were trying to make the confession more relevant to our lives, but for some
they made it completely irrelevant. The liturgy is designed to speak to all people. All
people may not commit exactly the same sins, but they all are sinners. Article 3 of
the Smalcald Articles addresses this. [Pr. Weedon read from Article 3.] It, along with
the Apostle Paul, says we are sinful, that there is nothing good within us. Paul says,
I know that in me, that is in my flesh, no good thing dwells.
A question people ask is, if we confessed our sins in the Confession, why do we seek
forgiveness again in the Lords Supper? The weight of sin is heavy. Picture your
inner life as a garden and the weeds keep popping up. Every day there are weeds to
pull. They keep coming back because the seed is there. The seed of sin is planted in
our fallen and corrupted nature. And it will be there until the grave. The fight never
ends. What happens if you stop weeding your garden? The weeds take over. So
there is always sin there that needs to be forgiven. And the confession can also lead
us to some good, wholesome, godly fear. In a couple of the settings of the Divine
Service we say we have deserved Gods temporal and eternal punishment. The
eternal punishment may seem a long way off, but the temporal punishment is now.
Think about it this way. One of the thieves on the cross reviled Christ for not getting
himself and them down from the cross. The other thief rebuke him saying that they
deserved it but Jesus didnt do anything wrong. Jesus told him, Today you will be
with me in paradise. He absolved him of his sin but he did not take the cross away
from him. He died as a thief on the cross. We all deserve temporal punishment, but
sometimes (though not always) God mitigates that punishment. We are confessing
that we deserve to be punished and that should move us to be afraid. Many people
think that because they have been forgiven that the temporal consequences have
been removed too. This is not true. But God is a merciful God and he does keep us
many times from suffering the consequences of our sin that we deserve.
The Scripture Par Excel Lance on Confession The Parable of the Pharisee
and Tax Collector
In the parable of the Pharisee and tax collector they both make a confession. This is
the only time that Jesus uses the word that means declared righteous. All of our
confessions ask for mercy based on the work of Jesus Christ. The Pharisee makes a
confession before God of what a great person he is. On the other hand, the tax

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collector confesses that he is not worthy to come before God. And the key is what
he actually asks of God. He doesnt use the word eleison (have mercy). He asks
God for propitiation Lord give me a wiping out of my sin; Lord give me a bloody
substitute. In scripture without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. The
word he uses is the same word that is used in the OT for the covering with blood. He
is pleading for an atonement sacrifice. When we make our confession, we plead for
the same thing when we ask for mercy for the sake of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the
propitiation for our sins. So when we ask for mercy, we are not just saying, Father
be lenient or kind. We are saying, Father look upon the atonement, look upon the
blood that was offered, be gracious to us on account of the blood Jesus shed for us.
Is that why the absolution must be directed completely from the cross? It cant be,
Dont worry about; God loves you anyway. Yes, it has to anchored in the cross and
the blood Jesus shed on the cross. Yes, we will actually talk a lot about that next
time when we discuss absolution.
What do you say to someone who says, Ive had heard this before. At my church
we dont have confession and absolution. This is completely alien to me, but what
youve laid out based on scripture is very compelling. This sounds like how worship
should be. This is of primary importance. At my church we just sing five songs and
the pastor talks for 45 minutes. Id say, Youve been deprived of your birthright as
a Christian. And I would encourage you to go to a place that respects your birthright
as a Christian and delivers to you fully the gifts of Jesus Christ.
Session 3 - Absolution
Introduction to Absolution
You might convince Christians they need to confess their sins, but to most, having a
pastor say, I forgive you all your sins is out of the question. They would say, Only
God can forgive sins. Today we are going to talk about the absolution the
forgiveness of our sins. Why do people have such a hard time accepting the pastor
saying, I forgive you all your sins? Because it is coming from the mouth of a
sinner. What right does he have to do this when he has sins that need to be forgiven
too?
Opposition to Jesus Forgiving Sin
Jesus faced the same opposition. Take a look at the story of Jesus healing the
paralytic in Mark 2. When the paralytic is lower down to Jesus through the roof,
Jesus didnt immediately heal him. Instead, Jesus said to him, Son be of good
cheer, your sins are forgiven. When the people heard this, they questioned in their
hearts how Jesus could say this. Jesus responded by asking, Whats easier to do? To

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say your sins are forgiven or rise up and walk? The people probably said to
themselves, Its easy to say your sins are forgiven. How would anyone know for
sure. To heal the man was easy for Jesus to do. But in forgiving him of his sins,
Jesus had to rely on his own bloody sacrifice and death. The cross was not easy.
Because of the cross, Jesus could say, Your sins are forgiven. The people think
healing the man is the hard part, so Jesus does it too. But that was not nearly so
hard as going to the cross. The miracle of his healing was a sign that attested to
Jesus authority to forgive sins.
At this point our listeners would stop you and say, Its one thing for Jesus to forgive
sins. After all he is God. But that doesnt give a pastor the right to forgive sins. We
will answer their objection, but first there is another Bible story we need to go over.
A Story About The Nature of the Forgiveness of Sins
There is a favorite story of confession and absolution in the OT that is absolutely
crucial in getting what this is about. Instead of being out leading the army in battle,
king David was at home when he saw a neighbors wife bathing. Instead of turning
away, he lusts after her and went and committed adultery with her. She became
pregnant and he concocted a scheme to try and make it look like the baby was
Uriahs (her husband). When that didnt work, he arranged for Uriah to be killed by
placing him in the front lines of battle. David thinks he got away with it. He then
took Uriahs wife and marries her. This looked good to everyone. What a great thing
David did! He took the poor widow who is pregnant as his wife and will take care of
her and the baby. But then God sent the prophet Nathan to David and he tells David
a parable in order to point out Davids sin. He tells him a sheep story. David had
been a shepherd so he could relate to it. Nathan told the story and in Davids
response, David condemned himself. David said the man in the story is guilty and
should die for it. And then Nathan turned to David and said, You are the man! You
are guilty of taking another mans wife. You are guilty of murder. As a powerful king,
David could have said off with your head! But no, thats not what he did. Instead he
said, I have sinned against God. Ps. 51 is a reflection on this; it is a confession of
sin. In his confession David doesnt make any excuses. He doesnt say he is sorry.
Instead he said, What God has just said through Nathan, that I am the man that is
guilty and deserves to die, is true. He says the same thing as God; he agrees with
God. And at that very moment, Nathan speaks absolution to David. He tells David,
The Lord has put away your sin. You shall not die. But the Hebrew word used here
means transferred. David would not die, but there is One who will die for that sin
Jesus Christ. Davids sin was transferred to Jesus and Jesus paid the price for it.
Nathan also announces that the son Bathsheba was pregnant with would die. Stop
for a second and think about what that means. The son of David will die for the sin
of David. We can even speculate further. David fasted and prayed that the son not
die. But on the seventh day the baby boy did die. If an Israelite baby boy died on

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the seventh day, he died before he could be placed into the covenant. (An Israelite
baby boy became a part of the covenant when he was circumcised on the eighth
day.) He was cut off from the people of God and died with the sin of David upon him.
This child points us to Jesus who was from the line of David. Jesus was a son of
David. [Jesus took the sins of the whole world upon himself. And Jesus died because
of and with the sin of world upon him.] Absolution is never free. It is free to you the
sinner, but it was paid for by the Son of God, the Son of David, who bore the sin of
the world and died the death that we deserved.
So going back to our original story we discussed of Jesus forgiving the paralytic and
then healing him, when Jesus asked, Which is easier? To forgive sin or to heal? To
forgive sin, Jesus must bear all the sins of the world and die for them.
Another Story of Forgiveness
There is another passage I want to take a look at that expresses some of the same
thoughts as the story of David. In John 8, a woman was caught in the act of adultery
and brought to Jesus. And they remind Jesus that God speaking through Moses said
that she should be punished by being stoned to death. And Jesus said, Ok, kill her.
But let the one who has no sin cast the first stone. One by one everyone left
because they realized that each of them were sinful. Finally it was just Jesus and the
woman. No one condemned her. And Jesus said, Neither do I condemn you. Now
Jesus is the eternal Word. Basically the word that Moses spoke about stoning the
woman was received from the pre-incarnate Christ. So how can Jesus not condemn
her? He could say this because he was going to die in her place for her sin. The
stone of the Law would condemn him and kill him.
The weight then of the absolution is blood weight. Absolution is not God saying,
There, there, its ok. Dont worry about it. I forgive you. Absolution is God saying,
Ive taken your sins and placed them on Jesus. He has paid the price that you
deserved to pay. He bore their weight for you. He died the death that you deserved.
Dr. Norman Nagel used to say, paraphrasing Luther, If your sin is on Jesus it isnt on
you. So absolution removes the weight of sin from you because the load has been
placed on Jesus.
How Can a Man, Other than Jesus, Say, I Forgive You All Your Sins?
So Jesus, the sinless One, is the only one qualified to throw the first stone. But he
doesnt. Since he took her sin upon himself, he can rightfully say, I do not condemn
you. Go and sin no more. But how is it that a man, a pastor, can say, I forgive your
sins? The only way that a pastor can say this is if Jesus has authorized him to say it.
And that is what happened when Jesus instituted the Office of the Keys. Jesus gives
pastors the keys that unlock heaven. This occurs three times in the scriptures.

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(1) In Matthew 16:19, where Peter makes his great confession, Jesus says he will
give to him the keys to the kingdom of heaven and whatever you bind on earth
shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in
heaven. So he tells Peter if you loose people of their sins, then they will be free of
them.
(2) The same type of language is used two chapters later. Jesus is speaking to his
disciples about repentance and in Matt. 18:18 Jesus says, Truly, I say to you,
whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on
earth shall be loosed in heaven. The word you here is plural. And this occurs
when two or three are gathered in his name. This happens in the church.
(3) But some people might still think that this binding and loosing language is a bit
too ambiguous to be hanging this declaration of the forgiveness of your sins by a
pastor on. In the next passage in John 20 Jesus is more direct. In this passage Jesus
has risen from the dead. He has defeated sin. Jesus is the Forgiveness of Sins in the
flesh. And he has also defeated death. Jesus came to his disciples and showed them
his body. Jesus said to them, Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so
I am sending you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to
them, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them;
if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld. What right does a man have
the right to stand in front of a bunch of sinners and pronounce forgiveness? Jesus
sent them out to do that very thing. As the Father sent Jesus to win forgiveness, so
Jesus sends out his pastors to distribute forgiveness. Jesus wishes to give this
forgiveness as a sure anchor for the soul, something rock solid certain that they
could hang on to.
When Satan tempts us to sin he uses the Gospel. He says, God loves you no matter
what. Go ahead and do it. Then after you sin, Satan uses the Law. He says, youve
done a terrible thing. You are no good. You deserve punishment. And then most
people suffer the shame and guilt all alone. It weighs heavy on their conscience.
How do we deal with this? Private confession and absolution are designed just for
this purpose. But also every week the church has a remedy for this. Christ gave us a
way where he speaks through the pastor and you hear with your own ears the Good
News of forgiveness. Since Christ has authorized it, you can be certain that it is true
and valid.
So are you saying that the pastor is telling us about forgiveness? No. It is not a
piece of information. It is a performative word. It does what it says. Our words, as
human words, dont have that power. Gods word has that power. For instance in the
beginning God said, Light, be and it was. By his speaking it became a reality. So
when God says to you [through the pastor], Your sins are forgiven, they are. Gods
word conveys that which it says. Its not just informational. It is literally giving you
forgiveness.

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We tend to think about this in the wrong way. Always remember that forgiveness is
not something you can possess. It would be like saying you possess air. So it would
be stupid to breathe air in and then just hold it, not breathe again. As we constantly
receive air to breathe, so we must constantly receive forgiveness of our sins. God
has made us to be receptive beings. We continue to sin, so we must continue to
receive forgiveness of our sins. Some people ask, Weve received forgiveness in
Absolution, why do we need forgiveness again in the Supper? Because this
forgiveness that we receive gives us life. We constantly need life poured into us.
Otherwise we are dead.
So Absolution gives us a gift that we desperately need. Its not just information. It
literally gives us the loving embrace of our heavenly Father.
Those Troubled by the Words of Our Absolution
We need to get to the actual words of the Absolution. But before we do, in the
context of the worship wars, and congregations making changes to the liturgy, the
first thing to go often is the Absolution. They might retain a confession, which is
usually watered down, but the Absolution is normally the first thing to go. Its
usually replaced with a declaration of grace, which is informational and not a
performative act. The I forgive you goes away because some people have a
problem with it.
On the other hand, some people have a problem with the Absolution because it
does not retain the sins of the impenitent as Jesus said. Pr. Weedon read the words
of an Absolution used back in 1569. It gives the forgiveness of sins to the penitent,
but it also specifically retains the sins of those who are impenitent or unbelieving. It
announces that God continues to hold their sin against them and that it will be
punished. This retention is built into our Absolution into the phrase, Upon this your
confession. In other words, Assuming that you just meant this confession that you
just said, then your sins are forgiven.
The text of our Absolution
So lets get to the text of the Absolution we use. It goes like this. Upon this your
confession, I, as a called and ordained servant of the Word, announce the grace of
God to all of you, and in the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus Christ I
forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit. So the pastor says in the stead, that is, in the place of, and by the
command of Jesus. The pastor is doing this as an authorized representative of
Jesus. He is doing this because Jesus commanded it.
Pr. Weedon then read an Absolution used at the time of Luther. It is his all time
favorite Absolution because it is pure Gospel.

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Forgiveness
Someone will inevitably then ask, Ok, at the beginning of the service I receive the
forgiveness of my sins. So what is the rest of service for? There are many other
parts of the service which are about forgiveness, why? Our response is, if its a
Christian service, it will be filled with the forgiveness of sins. The church is all
forgiveness, all the time. That is what the church of Jesus Christ is about. She exists
to give forgiveness.
One thing to be clear about. Forgiveness is not a thing. Forgiveness is God coming
to you in such a way that he brings you mercy, life and not destruction. So
forgiveness is the gift of God himself coming to you in mercy. And you need him, not
just once, but constantly. Your whole being depends on him coming to you
constantly. Remember when Isaiah came into Gods presence. He knew he was toast
because he was a sinner. But God in mercy provided a way to forgive him, so that
Gods presence would not destroy him; its actually life.
This forgiveness is to be the main part of the sermon and the Supper. Its as if God
is saying, I know you have a hard time believing how much I am for you. I am going
to bathe you in forgiveness in this Divine Service, so that you will know that your
sins will never separate you from me. My forgiveness is bigger than your sin. My joy
is greater than your sorrow.
Certainty
The historic liturgy delivers certainty. Its not about some god out there somewhere
forgiving sinners in some general sense. Absolution and the entire historic liturgy
delivers the certainty of the forgiveness of sins. The certainty, the unshakeable
guarranteedness, of Absolution is that God forgives us sinners. He gives forgiveness
to each of us sinners. All of them are forgiven. And that is the greatest comfort and
joy that you can have that will ease the conscience. It is concrete. You can know
that on a certain date you were at church and you heard the pastor say, I forgive
you all your sins. This is Gods word for you.
Session 4 - The Introit and Gloria Patri

The Formal Start of the Liturgy
We are beginning part 4 of our discussion on the historic liturgy. The Introit is the
formal beginning of the service. If the Introit is the formal start of the service, what
were we doing before the Introit? What precedes the Introit is called the Preparation.
The preparation to celebrate the liturgy is what we do in the Invocation, the
Confession, and the Absolution. In the history of the Lutheran Church, the

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Confession and Absolution werent always just before the Introit. Sometimes they
occurred at other parts of the service. After the sermon was once a popular spot for
them.
So the service itself begins with this thing called the Introit, which is a Latin word for
entrance. And this entrance is a movement. Historically the clergy would vest up
near the entrance of the church. So then they would need to get up from there up to
the front to the altar. Literally, the pastor would signal the singers to start the
music, which was always a Psalm. As the Psalm was sung, the clergy would process
through the church up to the altar area. When they did this, they represented the
people coming into the presence of God. The way that many ancient churches were
constructed, around the altar was a picture of Jesus upon the throne surrounded by
angels. The altar then represents the throne of God and is the place where Jesus will
come to us with his body and with his blood to give us eternal salvation. So the
pastor moves into the presence of God accompanied by the music of the Introit.
Movement in the Liturgy
During the Introit, the pastor deliberately moves to the altar. This is not just getting
the pastor into position to lead the service. This is a sign that all the people of God
are being gathered together in heaven before God at his throne. We are joining the
whole church of Christ at the throne of the Lamb. This is pictured for us in
Revelation. Heaven has come down to us. Earth and heaven have become one in
Christ. So when we approach the altar we approach with humility and reverence and
awe.
Why is this movement done when a psalm is sung? The Psalms are the churchs
primary song book. So we use psalms at the Introit, the Gradual, the Alleluia verse,
the Offertory, and during Communion. The words that the Holy Spirit gave the
church to sing (the Psalms) are the very best words we could sing.
Antiphon
The Introit is composed of an antiphon (a verse or verses from the psalm), the
Gloria Patri, the ancient song of the church Glory be to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit..., [the psalm,] and then the antiphon again. Antiphon means
back and forth. Usually a leader would sing the first verse, providing the musical
tone for the psalm. Then the choir would know how to sing the psalm for the day. At
the time of the Reformation the people did not sing the Introit or the Gloria Patri, the
choir did.
Earlier we said when the movement of the pastor into the altar area was shortened,
the length of the Introit was shortened. Sometimes it was shortened so much that
the main point of the Introit was lost. The antiphon, the little verse that comes in
front of the psalm, announces every Sunday the theme of that Divine Service. It

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tells you what is being celebrated. As an example Ill use the Introit for the Nativity,
the night of the Lords birth: When all was still and it was midnight youre almighty
Word O Lord descended from the royal throne. So the theme of the day is: Gods
almighty Word coming to us in the middle of the night bringing disaster on the
enemies of the people of God. Pr. Weedon gave a couple of more examples. Then
the psalm that follows picks up the theme first expressed in the antiphon. So when
the psalms became cut down, many times the theme expressed in the psalm was
lost. In modern times we have put more of the psalm back into the Introit so that we
dont lose the theme.
Uniformity Led to Communication
These Introits were set for given Sundays. So generally speaking, wherever the
Divine Service was being held, the same Introits were being used everywhere. That
then led to a name being given to each Sunday, which was based on the opening
words of the Introit. This uniformity was very important for communication.
Throughout the ages the world did not have phones, cell phones, the internet, TVs,
etc. to communicate with. So with uniformity in the church services, it didnt matter
which church you went to. You knew that all the churches had the same theme and
the same readings for a given Sunday. Uniformity then became important for
communication and for teaching. Christians across the centuries have used the
same Introits, Collects, and Readings on the same Sundays. [To a degree if
Christians from centuries ago were alive today, they would find some churches
using some of the same Introits, Collects, and Readings as they did.]
If the Divine Service is modified by churches, very often the Introit is one of the first
things to go. Why? Its because modern people do not have much of an appreciation
for the Psalter. The Psalter is some deep stuff. To pray the psalms requires some
growing in the Scripture. Its not for the novice. As important as the hymnal is for
Christians, the Psalter is more important.
The Christocentric Nature of the Introit
In a very real way, the Psalter has the prayers that Christ prays and the Psalter is all
about Christ. The psalms are words about Jesus. For instance, lets take
Transfiguration Sunday. We are celebrating Jesus shining on the mountain top and
he is there with both Moses and Elijah. The Introit begins by talking about the
lightnings of God lighting up the world and the loveliness of the dwelling place of
God. So on Transfiguration Sunday the Introit from Ps. 84 and the Antiphon from Ps.
77 tie right in. So the church uses the Psalter to unpack and proclaim the Good
News of Jesus.
The Apocrypha as a Source Used in the Liturgy

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Another example is the Introit for Ash Wednesday, which begins by speaking of
Gods mercy towards all he has made. And then the theme from the Introit is picked
up in Collect. The Antiphon for this Introit comes from the Apocrypha. For most
modern Christians the Apocrypha is something lost on them entirely. It was
considered to be a valuable source of liturgical text. The Apocrypha is not Scripture,
but Luther included it in his Bible. Luther considered it good and salutary to read but
not on par with Scripture. At the time of Luther the Apocrypha was read in church
alongside the Scriptures.
The Introit in the Church Year
During the festival part of the Church Year, the texts for the Introit are chosen to
correspond to the events of Christs life. But after Trinity Sunday, the Church literally
begins walking through the Psalter in the Introit. So for instance the psalm for Trinity
Sunday is Ps. 8 and the next week it is Ps. 13 and then Ps. 18 and then Ps. 25 and
then Ps. 27, etc. Psalms are skipped but it never goes backwards all the way
through the 18th Sunday after Trinity.
Tied Together
The Introit is tied to the Gospel lesson. And many times the other readings are tied
to the Gospel. The Gospel reading is the key to unlock the main theme for that
particular Sunday. The Introit helps people understand the Gospel reading and how
it is being proclaimed. So the various parts of the service are woven tightly
together. The exception to this is the Epistle lesson. In the Trinity season, a book is
selected and then read through from one Sunday to the next. So in that case they
were not directly tied to the Gospel reading.
The Gloria Patri
>>>>>The churchs practice whenever she uses the psalms is to end it by singing
the Gloria Patri, Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. There
is a historical context as to why the church does this. The Arians, the people who
denied that Jesus was true God and denied that the Holy Spirit was true God, had a
particular formula that they used. They said, Glory be to the Father through the
Son in the Holy Spirit. That formula allowed for the Son and Holy Spirit to be
subordinated to the Father. By using that formula the Arians were trying to confess
that Jesus was not God. The formula used to counteract the Arians was the Gloria
Patri that we use, which is based on the baptismal formula Jesus used in Matt. 28. It
stresses that glory is due to all three persons of the Trinity because all three are all
truly God. And it stresses that this has always been this way, is now, and always will
be. So using this formula when we pray the psalms communicates that we are
praying to the Triune God.

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Some people, apparently erroneously, taught that Christians began using the Gloria
Patri in order to distinguish their use of the psalms from that of the Jews who
rejected Jesus as the Messiah. But really Christians are saying that when we are in
Gods presence and praying to him that we are in Christs presence and he hears
our prayers. It is a formula that the Arians would not have been able to confess.
Many times when the Gloria Patri is sung, the ministers, and sometimes the people,
will bow. At the name of God, the angels hide their faces. So when he comes to us
and we are in his presence and we name his holy name, we bow in reverent awe.
Historically there was another bodily movement that went with the Introit. As the
pastor approached the altar, he would actually bend over and kiss the altar. This
was a way of confessing that this is the place where our God is going to come and
give us his very body and blood. Its a Jacob moment. This is the house of God. It is
a way of confessing that we are in the presence of God. And to this day when the
clergy approach the altar, whether it be for the Introit or at other times, they will
stop and bow in reverence, acknowledging the presence of the Holy Trinity.
Proclaiming Christ
Through the Introit, the Antiphon, the psalm, and the Gloria Patri the church is
already proclaiming Christ. As soon as you walk into church, the church is preaching
to you the life-giving words that you need. Through these things we praise God. And
in the Scriptures the way that God is praised is that the great deeds that he has
done are proclaimed. So praise and proclamation are almost one in the same. The
Introit proclaims the great thing that God has done that we are celebrating this day.
Session 5 The Kyrie

Introduction to the Kryie
The Kyrie is shorthand for Lord have mercy. It is the prayer that the church and
the Christian prays. It is a sort of all-purpose prayer. You pray it in times of great
distress. You pray it in time of joy. You pray it when your conscience burdens you.
You pray it after your conscience has been cleared because your sins have been
forgiven. In this prayer we pray for Gods great depth of mercy and our need for it.
Context in the Divine Service for the Kyrie
We gathered together in the holy name of the Triune God, the name into which we
were baptized. In the Invocation God gathered us together into his holy name and
therefore into his presence. In his presence we immediately became aware of our
sin and therefore confessed our sin. And in response, God hurriedly gives us the

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word of absolution, forgiving us our sins for Jesus sake. The congregations
response to the absolution was Amen [It is certainly true]. Then following the words
of Ps. 100, we enter Gods gates with thanksgiving in our hearts and songs of
praise. We literally take up the word of God to praise God. And the Introit contains
the theme for the readings of the day. The Introit is a prayer to the Triune God as
made clear by the Gloria Patri.
A Cry for Mercy to Our Merciful God
The next thing the church does, having entered into his presence and praised him in
the Introit, is to cry out to God for mercy. Thinking about mercy and the presence of
God, we cant help but think back on Moses encounter with God. Moses had begged
God to show himself to him. Of course he cant see God without being obliterated.
So God told him he would allow Moses to see his backside. And when the Lord
passed by, he named himself. This is recorded in Ex. 34:6: The LORD passed before
him and proclaimed, The LORD [Yahweh], the LORD [Yahweh], a God merciful and
gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, ... . This
proclamation of Gods name becomes the basis for the churchs prayer. Prayer is
always pulling things out of the name of God. And there is nothing more
fundamental to the name of God than mercy. He is the God who shows mercy. And
this is replete throughout the entire scriptures. As the church lives in the Spirit
receiving the gifts of Jesus, she realizes that Jesus is in every sense the answer to
our cry for mercy. He is the Merciful One.
What Mercy Is
Mercy is bigger than forgiveness.
When you have a guilty conscience, mercy is the gift of righteousness that
withstands the judgment of God.
When you are blind, mercy is being able to see.
When you are held captive by demonic forces of the world, mercy is being set
free.
When you are dead, mercy is being raised to life.
So mercy is a big, big thing. Thats why the Kyrie is the all-purpose prayer of the
Christian and of the church. Whatever the need may be or the occasion may be, the
Kyrie asks for right thing. When we cry out for mercy, we are fundamentally
recognizing that something is messed up in this world. And we are asking God to fix
it. We know we dont deserve it and we know we cant do anything about it, but we
plead to God who can do anything. We ask this of the One who is filled with
tenderness and kindness toward us. When we cry for mercy we are crying out to
God to fix what has gone wrong for this person, in this situation, in this world.
The Biblical Roots of the Cry for Mercy

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This isnt a prayer that Christians just made up. You find it all over in scripture.
Ps. 51:1 - Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.
Jesus taught that the fundamental thing about the Father in heaven is that he
is full of mercy. He unpacks that in Luke 6:32-36. Jesus says, Be merciful,
even as your Father is merciful. The mark of mercy is being kind and good
towards people who not only dont deserve it, but who actually deserve the
opposite. The people that mercy is shown to cant do anything to pay it back.
And yet the Father showers down good things on us. He is a fountain of
mercy.
In 1 Peter 2:9-10 Peter is trying to explain to Christians what it is that makes
them unique as the people of God. Peter says, But you are a chosen race, a
royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may
proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his
marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people;
once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Peters
definition of what it means to be a Christian is to be a person who has
received mercy from God.
In Rom. 15:9 Paul speaks about the Gentiles glorifying God for his mercy.
In Philippians Paul speaks about God having mercy on a person who is near
death, restoring him.
Paul speaks of his own conversion in 1 Tim.1:13: though formerly I was a
blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy
because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief,. Here mercy is pardon,
forgiveness.
Throughout the scriptures we see God giving out grace and kindness to undeserving
people.
The Word Kyrie
The church picked up this Greek word Kyrie and never changed it or translated it.
Another word like this is Amen, which is a Hebrew word which means this is most
certainly true. Similarly the word Hallelujah is a Hebrew word that means praise
be to God. There are also some Aramaic words like this that the church uses too. At
the time of the Roman empire, Greek was the language that everyone spoke. The
Greek words kyrie eleison mean Lord, have mercy and they were used all across
the Greek world, not just in a Christian sense. When the king or emperor came to
town, the people would cry out, Kyrie Eleison, be kind to us your people. The
church picked it up from that time and culture and kept it in the original language,
never bothering to translate it.
The History of the Kyrie in the Historic Liturgy

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The Kyrie came to its current place in the liturgy after the Introit by the influence of
the church in Milan. They used the Kyrie as a litany. They had a petition and then
after the petition would come the peoples response of Lord have mercy. So in this
version of the Kyrie several petitions would be prayed and each was followed with
Lord have mercy. In our Lutheran Service Book we have a version of this litanystyle Kyrie. In 1 Tim. 2:1 Paul said, First of all, then, I urge that supplications,
prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people .... So taking what
Paul said literally, one of the first things they did when they came together for
worship in the early church was to pray for all the people in the Kyrie. Pr. Weedon
then read through a version of the Kyrie in litany form. In it every person on earth is
brought before the Lord in prayer, seeking his mercy on them.
During the time of Gregory the Great, in the 600s, this longer litany came to be
compressed. In this form, the petitions had been removed, leaving simply, Lord
have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy. Then added on to this was, Christ
have mercy, Christ have mercy, Christ have mercy. And then that was followed
again by Lord have mercy three times. So it came to have Lord have mercy
three times, Christ have mercy three times, and Lord have mercy three times
for a total of nine. This form of the Kyrie stayed this way for 1000 years.
When Luther came along, he suggested they use the Kyrie in the Divine Service in
the same way that it was used in the daily prayers of the church in Matins and
Vespers. In those prayers the Kyrie had a three-fold use of Lord have mercy, Christ
have mercy, Lord have mercy. Most Lutheran churches followed Luthers
suggestion.
It was done this way until the 20th century when Lutherans recovered the Kyrie in its
broader scope as a litany. It also included prayers for the broader needs of the
world.
So the Kyrie is like an accordion. It can be very long or very short.
The Kyrie in a Biblical Context
When the Lord healed the demoniac, he told him to go back and tell what
great things God had done for him and how he had mercy on him in setting
him free.
And then we remember a woman whose daughter was extremely demon
possessed. Her prayer to Jesus was, Lord have mercy on me. By that she
meant, heal my daughter. That would be mercy for her and her daughter.
Most striking is when blind Bartimaeus cries out, Son of David, have mercy
on me. Jesus had mercy on him and restored his sight. And when he was
restored, Bartimaeus and all the people glorified God. Not coincidentally, the
next thing in the Divine Service after our cry for mercy is the Glory to God.

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And we especially remember the invitation we are given in Heb. 4:16. This
letter is written to a church which is suffering much and the people are being
tempted to fall away from Christ. They are told: Let us then with confidence
draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace
to help in time of need. We come to the throne of grace to find mercy. In the
Kyrie the church cries out for Gods mercy on herself and all people.
Retaining the Music of the Kyrie

The church wanted to maintain the music for the Kyrie even as it translated the
words of the Kyrie into various languages. The Greek version of the Kyrie had seven
syllables. In other languages there was a different number of syllables. In German
there were only 5 syllables, so they added on us to make it seven syllables. In
translating the German Kyrie to English you have, Lord have mercy upon us. That
gives the right number of syllables to keep the same music. The adding of on us
gives it a little more penitential tone. Originally the Kyrie was broader. It asked for
mercy that was not just pardon. On us focuses the prayer on the person praying
it. But the early Christians used the Kyrie to pray for everything and everyone.
This illustrates something important. Every change, even when done with the best
intentions, and even with the results of keeping the form for the music every
change, even if it is only small has consequences. Adding on us changes the focus
of the prayer.
The Kyrie and the Trinity
The use of the three-fold: Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy is
easily tied to the Trinity. Was this planned? No. In the NT the Kyrie is overwhelmingly
addressed directly to the Lord Christ. Therefore our singing of the Kyrie is addressed
to Christ who is our Lord. But because the church worships the Trinity, it became
inevitable that the Kyrie be applied to the Trinity. Pr. Weedon read an example of a
Kyrie that was used in the Middle Ages that applied the Kyrie to the Trinity. In
Luthers explanation of the first Article, he attributes a broad mercy to God the
Father in providing for his creation. But it is in the second Article that Gods mercy is
chiefly shown the work of the Son for mankind.
Distinction Between Ordinaries and Propers
The Kyrie is an ordinary part of every Divine Service every Sunday. It does not
change. The Introit, which we discussed last time, changes each week. It is a psalm
that is proper for that particular Sunday and time of the church year. So the parts of
the service that change week by week or season by season are called Propers. Then
there are others parts of the service that are the same week by week throughout
the year. They are part of the ordinary service and therefore are called Ordinaries.

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They provide the structure of the Divine Service. There are five ordinary texts the
Kyrie, the Gloria, the Creed, the Sanctus, and the Angus Dei.
What is the relationship of the Kyrie to what follows it, the Gloria? Its all tightly
bound together. The Gloria stresses the incarnation of Jesus. This was Gods great
mercy for mankind come down from heaven in human flesh. The church cries out for
mercy and then the church acknowledges that God has shown mercy in sending his
Son in the flesh. In the end, mercy is just another name for Jesus.
The Kyrie as a Personal Prayer
The Kyrie is not just a corporate prayer prayed in the Divine Service, but it is also a
prayer that each individual Christian can pray. During the early church there was a
prayer that was used extensively called the Jesus prayer. It is an extended Kyrie. It
is basically the prayer of the blind beggar: Lord Jesus Christ Son of God have mercy
on me the sinner. By saying the sinner instead of a sinner it recognizes that
humankind is one in its sinfulness and rebellion. On the cross Jesus literally became
the sinner for us. So this mercy we pray for is not just mercy for ourselves but for
others too. As sinners, we are all in this together. So our prayer for mercy for
ourselves is also a prayer for mercy for others. The church intercedes for the world,
even the unbelieving world. Part of what it means to be the church is to bear each
others burdens. So when we pray Lord have mercy, we pray for Gods mercy on
everyone, for God wants to show mercy to all.
The Church Intercedes for the World
If the church does not pray for the world, no one will. If the church does not seek
mercy for the world from God, the world has no one to intercede for her. The church
is standing in for a world that is blind and teetering towards destruction. It is vital
that the church intercede for Gods mercy for the world. It is the primary vocation of
the church. So in the prayers of the church in the Divine Service, the church prays
not just for itself and its members, but for the state, country, and world. Pr. Weedon
then read another Kyrie that provided a good example of the church using the Kyrie
to pray for the whole world. Christ intercedes for the world and the church joins her
prayers with Christs prayers for the world. And in the end, Christ is the prayer for
mercy.
Session 6 The Gloria

The Song of the Angels for All Time and Eternity
This is the song that the angels sang on the day of Jesus birth. Is this a song that is
not just for that day, but for Christs church to continue to use Sunday after Sunday?

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To answer this, we ask another question. Was Jesus given by the Father just for that
day? No, he was given for all time and eternity and all the gifts that come with him
are given for all time and eternity. So the church delights to repeat the song of the
angels and to expand the song of the angels. The Gloria in its expanded version
goes way back in time. Pr. Weedon then read a Syrian version of the Gloria, which is
one of the oldest versions we have. There is another very old version, a Byzantine
version. And there is an Orthodox version that they to this day use in Matins, which
is muck like the one we Lutherans use in our order of service.
In listening to the Syrian version that was read, there isnt a line in it that you
couldnt footnote to many Bible passages. It all comes from the Scriptures. The
Syrian version is an expanded version of the smaller one that we use in our hymnal.
How It Came to be Sung in the Divine Service
How did the Gloria get placed at this point in the Divine Service? It came to be used
in the Divine Service in the western church very gradually. In the sixth century, a
pope ordered that the Gloria be sung at the midnight Christmas Divine Service.
Then a little later another pope allowed it to be sung on Sundays and at the Feast of
Martyrs., but only at a Divine Service where a bishop was present. And it stayed
that way for a millennium in the western church. Eventually ordinary priests were
allowed to intone the Gloria at Christmas. And finally by the 1200s any pastor could
intone the Gloria on any Sunday. And then it became a standard practice to sing it
every Sunday. There were seasons of the church year where it was never customary
to intone the Gloria. It was not sung during Advent and Lent, the penitential
seasons. The Gloria was regarded as an expression of sheer joy and this was
regarded as being inappropriate to sing during those seasons. But there are some
exceptions to this. There are some orders of service that have the Gloria being sung
every time the Lords Supper is celebrated, during any of the church seasons.
How the Lutherans Adapted and Used the Gloria
Songs such as the Gloria were non-rhythmic and there was a push to rewrite them
in such a way that they would be in meter and rhyme. That happened to almost all
of the texts of the liturgy. The first Lutheran to do this with the Gloria was Luther.
But the tune Luther used didnt go over very well. Someone else wrote a better tune
and this version of the Gloria is in our hymnal as All Glory be to God Alone. But
there was another version of the Gloria that captured the German peoples hearts. It
is All Glory be to God on High. If you were to go back in time and ask one of our
German ancestors how the Gloria went, they would have thought of this hymn right
away. It was the Gloria that was sung every Divine Service.
Why was there this push to paraphrase and put in hymnic form various parts of the
liturgy? The Lutherans did this and so did the Calvinists. The Calvinists did it to the

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entire Psalter. Most likely it was done as an easy way to take a text and make it
memorable, to make it easy to remember. Think about some of the advertising
jingles you grew up with. Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce. Special orders dont
upset us. That was used over 40 years ago, but we still remember it because it is
in meter and in rhyme. So this made the liturgy accessible to the people. In
Lutheran history the various parts of the liturgy were set to all kinds of tunes. They
were not stuck singing the same tunes every week. And one of the great things of
the Reformation was to put the Gloria and other songs back in the hands of the
people for them to sing and not just the choir to sing.
Why the Gloria Follows the Kyrie
In the Introit we came into the presence of God with singing and thanksgiving and
the theme of the day was announced. In prayer (the Kyrie) we cried out to God for
mercy. And last session we found out how big that mercy is. And now as we stand in
the presence of God and behold by faith the Lamb, we realize that the Lamb, Jesus
Christ, is the mercy of God in human flesh. Gods answer to our cry for mercy is God
giving his Son into our flesh, to bear our sin to death, to rise from the grave in
victory, to destroy our death, to be our Mediator at the right hand of God, to present
our petitions to the Father, to bring us every good blessing. Jesus is the ultimate
answer to all of our cries for mercy. [And Jesus is the main subject of the Gloria.]
If you think about it there is a remarkable parallel between the Kyrie/Gloria and Luke
18 where a blind beggar cries out to Jesus for mercy: Jesus, son of David, have
mercy on me. Jesus stopped, went to him, and healed him. And then after Jesus
healed him, He immediately followed Jesus, glorifying God and all the people
praised God. So giving glory to God falls right on the heels of the cry for mercy. That
is why the Gloria follows immediately after the cry for mercy in the Kyrie in the
Divine Service.
The Text of the Gloria
The Gloria starts out with Glory be to God on high and then it speaks of the Trinity
and then it speaks of Christ before it goes back to the Trinity at the end. That is the
way that most of the versions of the Gloria go. It kind of starts with the Father,
spends most of the time on Jesus Christ and then mentions the Holy Spirit at the
end. And thats the signature of the Holy Spirit! The Spirit always focuses on Jesus
who brings you to the Father.
It starts out Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth. The next part of the
phrase is translated in different ways. Luther and the King James version translated
it and good will to men. It would probably be better rendered as to men of
goodwill. But of here does not mean men who have goodwill. It means people on
who Gods favor rests. So another way of translating that first line is: Glory to God

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in the highest and peace to those on whom his favor rests. A Catholic theologian
put it best.
The entrance of the Redeemer among the race of men spelled out two
things: glory for God and peace for man. Christs coming meant the start of
redemption. In this sense it is possible that the angels song contained not a
wish but the expression of a fact, not optative but declarative. Glory is given
to God and peace to man. It is the same thing that our Lord spoke of at the
Last Supper and in his great High Priestly prayer. The only difference being
the degree of development. Ive exalted thy glory on earth by achieving the
task which thou gavest me to do. But precisely because the glorification of
God and the salvation of mankind was not achieved in its fullness till the
sacrifice of Christs passion, and even then its fruit still had to ripen, and to
continue to ripen until the end of time. It is correct to view the angels song
as proclaiming not the work that has already been completed, but the plan
and purpose that has yet to be done step by step. May God be given glory in
the highest and may men find in his grace peace. And if this was true of the
song when the angels sang it, its truer still when we on earth repeat it.
Isnt that the point we were making at the beginning [that this was a song given by
God for the church to sing each Sunday]? Jesus came into the flesh in order that a
man might bring glory to God the way that men were intended to do. And then
peace from God to men. Jesus came to be that peace by shedding his blood and
destroying death and uniting us to himself. The goodwill of God is that he withholds
nothing good from us. He doesnt do as Satan said in the garden. Rather he gives
his full self to us in the incarnation and crucifixion. Jesus is the peace of God. Jesus
is the glory of God. He does not effect it; he is in himself these things.
That reorients our way of thinking and practicing the Gloria. It takes our focus away
from ourselves and wondering if we are giving God sufficient glory. It takes our focus
off of our glory making and puts it all where it belongs on Jesus Christ. Yes! Its like
a huge stone being thrown from the heavens into a lake. Of course its going to
cause the water to jump up into the air in praise and thanks. But the thing that
causes it to jump up in the air is that big rock being thrown down. Jesus presence
among men as Gods glory and peace causes this explosion of praise from men.
So we have to remember this when we sing this canticle. There is a lot of we stuff
in there. We praise thee. We glorify thee. We worship thee. We give thee
thanks for thy great glory. If you concentrate on we, you are reading it the wrong
way. The emphasis should be on thee instead. Who is this thee? It goes on to
name thee as the Lord God, our heavenly king, God the Father Almighty, O
Lord, the only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Some of the old versions add here Holy
Ghost.

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Then we get the words of John the Baptist, the Lamb of God who takes away the
sin of the world, have mercy on us. The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of
the world, receive our prayer. Jesus is our mediator. He makes our petitions known
to the Father. Jesus, you who sit at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us.
We confess Jesus and what he has done. Notice how this moved from Christmas to
Good Friday to Ascension. So we have the whole scope of salvation before us in one
song. It takes about two minutes to sing the Gloria. It only takes two minutes to tell
the whole story of salvation. It tells all that Jesus came to do and to achieve.
You alone are the holy one. That was snatched directly out of Revelation from one
of its songs [Rev. 15:4]. This is also picked up on in another part of the liturgy. In the
Supper the priest would turn to the people with the Lords body and blood and say,
The holy things for the holy ones. And the people say back to the priest, There is
only one who is holy. There is only one who is Lord, Jesus Christ. In other words, we
are only holy because of what he is giving us and because of what he has done for
us.
In him we are holy. He is the holy One. You only are holy. You only are the Lord. You
only are most high Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit in the glory of God the Father.
So here at the end, it wraps right back around to the glory of God. To get there, it
has taken you from Bethlehem; its visited John the Baptist at the Jordan; its taken
you Calvary where Johns words were fulfilled; its taken you through the
resurrection to Christs ascension and has hinted at the return of Christ when
heaven and earth will be filled with Gods glory.
Questions From Listeners
Why do we keep the Latin form of Gloria and the Greek form of Kyrie? That is a
peculiarity of English. Its different for instance in German. In the Latin service they
still sang kyrie eleison (Greek).
How much is the Lutheran liturgy in English influenced the traditional Book of
Common Prayer translations in the western liturgy from Latin and how much of
Luthers German Mass is present in the liturgy? Divine Service 3 in the hymnal is
basically the text from the Book of Common Prayer. The Anglicans did a good job.
So rather than reinvent the wheel, we used their translation. We also have Divine
Service 5, which is the German Mass from Dr. Luther in 1526 BC.
The Fathers Glory
The Gloria starts with glory and ends with glory. But that glory is a particular kind of
glory. Its the kind of glory thats in the High Priestly prayer where the glory is the
Fathers glory. And Jesus is there revealing it to his disciples and they are all
wrapped together in the glory of God the Father. The great shining of God the Father
is that which shines from the cross. It shows his unfathomable love that reaches out

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and embraces those who are persecuting and killing and that says, I love you and
forgive you. That is the glory that shines in Jesus Christ. It began to shine in
Bethlehem at his birth and the glory of Gods love will be the final triumph. So this
hymn takes us from eternity past to eternity future. Jesus reveals the glory of God
that he had with the Father before the world began that they may see it and share
it.
World Without End?
It ends with world without end. Thats a strange phrase because the Bible says
that the world very clearly will have an end. Thats sort of a bad translation.
Perhaps the phrase being translated would be better rendered as unto the ages of
ages. In other words, unto that age that is the end of all ages, that moment where
Christ shines in glory and love is all that remains. A different translation is and will
be forever. It drops the concept of ages. The idea is that there is an age that is
coming and that time that is coming will be the manifestation of Christs glory and
reign. Its the same thing that Jesus says when he says, I will be with you to the
very end of the age.
(A couple of questions from listeners.)
A High Point in the Liturgy

Briefly talk about the peaks in the liturgy, such as the Gloria. The Absolution is one
peak. The Gloria is the next peak. Then will come the Alleluia and the reading of the
Gospel. The Sermon is also a peak. The Sanctus is a peak. And finally the reception
of the Lords Supper is a peak as well as being sent out with the Benediction. At
these peaks great joy has been compressed together into a single moment. In each
of these moments Gods glory flashes as it were in our face.
Next Time
We are not done with this part of the liturgy. In the Lutheran liturgy we have a
choice. We can sing the Gloria, as we just discussed, or we can sing Worthy is
Christ. Next time we will discuss that canticle, where it came from, and how it
became a part of the Divine Service.
Session 7 The Alternate Hymn of Praise: Worthy is Christ

An Example of How the Divine Service Grows

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Over time things are added to the liturgy. It grows. And this particular song has
been added in recent years. Now when something grows out from the liturgy it is
entirely different than taking the entire liturgy and completely replacing it. The
historic liturgy is a living thing and so it is always adding new branches here and
there. As the years go by, it grows richer and richer. Why is it a living thing? It grows
out of an interaction between the word of God and the people of God. The word of
God is living and active and because of that it will continue to grow. The tree is
always the same tree but it experiences new growth, the song continues to expand.
Where Worthy is Christ Came From
The canticle first appeared early in the twentieth century (1917) in the Common
Service book. It was noted in this book that it could at times replace the Gloria.
Probably a Lutheran scholar was responsible for adding it. He had worked
extensively in the book of Revelation. It then appeared in the Lutheran hymnal of
1941 as one of the canticles. After Vatican II (late 1960s, early 1970s) there was an
effort to renew the spirit of the liturgy. That is the time when the three year
lectionary became dominant. At that time it was proposed that this alternate
canticle be allowed to be used in the place of the Gloria. It was thought that a man
named John Arthur, a pastor in the LCA, wrote Worthy is Christ. So this piece was
introduced into American Lutheranism. And it exploded. The people heard it and
they loved it. And as result, this piece that they said could be used occasionally
began to be used in many churches as the regular song instead of the Gloria. That is
contrary to the intention by which it was introduced. It was never intended to
replace the Gloria entirely.
Is the fact that this is peculiar to Lutheranism a bad thing? No. We have a number of
peculiarities. Lutherans celebrate the Transfiguration on the last Sunday of the
Epiphany season. Peculiarities are ok as long as they mesh with the Lutheran
confessions.
The spot in the liturgy that Lutherans sing it is unique. This hymn is a Lutheran gift
to the world. It has been taken up into Catholic and Anglican hymnals as a hymn, a
hymn of praise to the Lamb.
The Biblical Roots of the Song
This song is obviously set in the book of Revelations. In Revelation there was an
opening vision and then the letters to the seven churches. Then John is called to
look through the open door of heaven. John then has a vision of the glorious
presence of God upon the throne. There was a scroll that contained the very
meaning and plan of life. And it was sealed shut with seven seals and no one could
open it. But there came a Lamb that had been slain, it break the seals and open the
scroll. This is described in Rev. 5. The Lamb is the key to unlock the scroll, to unlock

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the scriptures. And the Lamb and the opening of the seals becomes the cause for
this explosion of praise in heaven. A song of praise is sung, beginning in verse 9.
The song speaks of the Lamb and extols him as being worthy to open the scroll,
since he gave his life and blood in order to ransom the people of God. The angels,
the saints, and all living creatures praise the Lamb. This is the primary setting for
this canticle.
Why Sing It Here?
The Gloria had at its core Jesus as the Lamb of God. So this image of the Lamb is
central to either of these two hymns of praise. So this hymn here functions in
exactly the same way as the Gloria. It proclaims the praises of the One whose
presence we have been gathered and who is now preparing to break open the seals
so that the scroll is opened to read and explain to us the very meaning of life as it is
presented in the scriptures which proclaim the suffering, death, and resurrection of
the Lamb. This hymn, as well as the Gloria, focus us on Christ.
The Church on Earth Sings of the Future Brought into the Present
This then is heavenly worship that looks forward to things yet to come. It is the
church triumphant that sings it. Why is it important that the church on earth sings
this song? The very nature of being the church is that we live from Gods future. In
other words, God takes the future that is to be and brings it to us into the present
for it to be our life. The church is a colony on earth from the future. When Jesus
broke into our world when he was incarnated, he brought this future with him. It is
the gift of the church to the world to offer this heavenly worship here on earth. In
the future we will gather together around the throne of God and sing Worthy is the
Lamb. All people will acknowledge that the Lamb is worthy of praise because he
was slain for us. The theme of the Lamb runs throughout the scriptures (the Garden,
Abel, the daily sacrifices, the Lamb as a person in Isaiah, John the Baptist identifies
Jesus as the Lamb of God), the Lamb who was slain and sacrificed for the world and
the life of the world.
The Text of the Canticle
Lets take a look at the words of the canticle used in Divine Service 2. It starts out
with This is the feast of victory for our God, Alleluia! That refers specifically to the
Eucharist. It is the feast. It is Gods victory celebration. It is the thanksgiving
sacrifice, the sacrifice of Ps. 116 where God has rescued you from death and there
is a celebration. This is Christs thanksgiving sacrifice. He has been set free from
death and so the Eucharist is the thanksgiving that the church gives in union with
the Lamb who was slain but now lives forevermore.
The actual hymn begins with worthy is Christ, the Lamb who was slain, whose
blood set us free to people of God. It is the blood of the Lamb that truly sets us

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free, free from the consequences of our sin. Our sin separates us from God, but the
blood of the Lamb overcomes that separation. We are set free by his blood so that
we can actually be the people of God, believing in and praising the Lamb.
It continues with, Power, riches, wisdom, and strength, and honor, blessing, and
glory are His. We have such a great contrast. On the one hand we have the
crucified Lamb who shed his blood. On the other hand, we have power and riches
and strength, etc. By being lifted up on a tree, Jesus brings all people to God and
that is the moment of his glorification. So the picture we should get when Jesus is
described as having power, riches, wisdom, etc. is not one of a celestial being, but
of a Lamb that has been slain on a tree. God came in the flesh giving his life away,
pouring out blood to cover our sin.
It continues with the refrain This is the feast of victory for our God, Alleluia. And
then we sing, Sing with all of the people of God, and join in the hymn of all
creation. To sing with all of Gods people is to sing with those have died in the faith
and with those who are alive in the faith and with those yet to come. In Rev. 5, this
song started out with the elders but they are joined in singing by the angels and all
of creation in giving praise and glory to the Lamb. And that is what happens in our
worship. In this hymn we look forward to eternity when all of creation joins in
praising God. This is in contrast to what Paul says is happening now. At present the
creation is groaning under the weight of sin and is aching for this moment to arrive.
The way he puts it is that creation is in childbirth giving birth to a new creation. In
the end, divine love triumphs over all, rules over all, will be manifest to all. That
same love shines from the crucified body of Jesus.
It goes on with Blessing, honor, glory, and might be to God and the Lamb forever,
Amen and a repeat of the chorus. The Holy Spirit doesnt get mentioned, but how
characteristic it is that the Spirit focuses us on Jesus who brings us to the Father.
The mark of a true Trinitarian piece is that it may not explicitly mention the Holy
Spirit!
There is a line coming up that a listener has a question about. In the line For the
Lamb who was slain has begun His reign. Alleluia. What does it mean that the
Lamb has begun his reign? Wasnt Christ reigning before he was slain? Certainly
there is a sense in which we confess that the eternal Word has always reigned. The
language here is taken from Revelation 11:17 where it says he had begun to reign.
Through the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the kingdom of God became
established in the hearts of men. Something has happened here for the entire world
so that all human beings can be brought into his kingdom. And the omnipotent
Gods idea of reigning is to be servant of all. There is nothing higher in the world
than to serve others.
The Song Looks Forward to the Eternal Feast of the Lamb

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A question from a caller. Is This Is The Feast directed toward the foretaste we
receive in the Lords Supper or toward the eternal feast with Christ in heaven or
both? And why? Yes to the last part of it. It looks through the Eucharist to what the
Eucharist is itself a sign and gift of, and that is to the Feast of the Lamb that will be
celebrated eternally. The Lords Supper brings the future feast into the present as
well as the past of Christs saving work into the present. This reminds me of one of
the great things Luther once said of the Eucharist: In the Lords Supper forgiveness
isnt won, but it is bestowed. And at the cross, forgiveness was won, but its not
bestowed. So when some said we need to go back to the cross, Luther would say:
No, why do you want to back there?. Thats done and there is no promise at the
cross. But we do have a promise that the forgiveness won for us on the Calvarys
tree is what is given to us in the Supper and he gives it to you as the foretaste and
pledge of the eternal feast we will share with him. Some people hear that phrase a
foretaste of the feast to come as a shadow of what is to come and not the
substance of what is to come. That is not correct. The feast is already happening in
heaven. And God brings and gives to us in the Supper some of that eternal meal.
Singing Both the Gloria and This is the Feast
A caller writes in that at his church they sing both songs of praise. They sing the
Gloria at its traditional spot and they sing This is the Feast at the beginning of the
distribution of the Lords Supper. Pr. Weedon commented that that was a great use
of This is the Feast. He stressed once again that This is the Feast was never
intended to replace the Gloria. It works well as the hymn of praise during the Easter
season or All Saints Day, but it should not replace the Gloria every Sunday. Yet we
know that the people love to sing it. So the church for this caller has a good idea to
incorporate both into their service.
[Other questions from listeners.]
Singing Alleluia
The word Alleluia is used throughout This is the Feast. It is a Hebrew word that
means praise the Lord. But when the church sings it, the church is recognizing
that we are in the presence of the Lord who is the great giver of gifts. In recognition
of this, there is an explosion of praise in this song. It is an amazing experience to be
in church, in Gods presence, singing Alleluia.
Some churches have a banner with Alleluias on it. It stands in the church all year
except during Lent. During Lent it is taken out and then it returns on Easter. Why
does the church do that? During Lent we focus on our sin which is not a joyful thing.
Generally speaking, the hymn of praise, and consequently the Alleluia, is not sung
during Lent. Instead we reflect on what our sins brought to our Lord suffering and

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death. So during Lent, its like the Alleluias are pent up within us and when Easter
comes the Alleluias explode on the scene.
Session 8 The Salutation and Collect

Introduction
The salutation is short and goes like this. The pastor says or sings, The Lord be
with you. And the congregation responds with, And also with you. This salutation
is an ancient greeting that has remained a part of the service throughout the
centuries. More recently in order to make it more meaningful to people some
churches have replaced it with Good morning and Good morning to you too or
Nice to see you and Nice to see you too. But do these replacements capture the
true meaning of the salutation? Today we will discuss the salutation and some of the
most ancient prayers of the church that are prayed each Sunday.
Changes to the Salutation in Recent Years
As we said in the introduction one of the more extreme changes to the Salutation is
to make it a Good Morning between the pastor and the congregation. But normally
the first part of the Salutation is left the same. It begins with the pastor saying, The
Lord be with you. It is the second part that has been changed over the last 40
years. The congregations response has been changed from And with your spirit to
And also with you. The Catholic Church first changed it. And the Lutheran Church
followed suit. So the response is now confusing because we dont know which
response to use. In most settings we use And also with you (Divine Services 1, 2,
4, 5 and morning and evening prayers). But in Divine Service 3 we use And with thy
spirit. And in Matins and Vespers we use And with your spirit. That is one of the
biggest failures of our hymnal. You shouldnt have to think about the response. It
should always be automatic and the same.
The Salutation is Much More Than, Hi
Why does this matter? Have we lost sight of what the Salutation is, which has in
turn led to this confusion? Partially, yes. Weve tried to make the Salutation simply a
greeting. But its really more than that. The Salutation occurs in Divine Service
Three in 3 different spots. Each time it occurs, it occurs just before an invitation for
the congregation to act in some way. (1) First, at this part of the liturgy it occurs just
before the congregation prays. (2) It next occurs in the preparation for Communion
just before the congregation is invited to give thanks to the Lord our God. (3) And
then at the end of the service the Salutation is given just before the pastor invites
the congregation to bless the Lord. So the Salutation is more than, Hi, hows it
going?. Its an invitation to act corporately together. Its a recognition that we are

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working together, pastor and congregation, as one people with the pastor leading
the congregation.
When we say, The Lord be with your spirit, we mean may the Lord be with your
whole being. Now, there is a rule that says the Salutation should never be spoken
by a lay person. Its the same way with the Benediction. Only the pastor can say it
in its declarative form. So when the pastor speaks the Salutation, he speaks it as
the authorized representative of Christ. The spirit here then references more than
the pastors spirit, the pastor himself. The spirit also references the Spirit of
Christ. The Holy Spirit acts through the pastor as he fulfills the office he is called to.
So in the Salutation, we recognize the office of pastor. Some have called the
Salutation, the little ordination. In his office, the pastor speaks and acts on behalf of
the people. So the word spirit has a lot of weight to it that is lost when you is
used. So what is being lost by saying you instead of spirit is the recognition of
the pastoral office and that the pastor is acting on behalf of the congregation in the
Divine Service.
If watch the pastor during the service, you will notice that he faces two ways. At
times he faces the altar and when he does as he represents and speaks for the
congregation. It has been customary that the pastor speaks all of the prayers. In
doing so he is a kind of visual symbol of Christ speaking our prayers to the Father.
At other times the pastor faces the people. When he does this, he is giving a gift
from God to the people. He is acting and speaking for God.
Question from Listener
Should the pastor say the part of the pastor and the parts of the people in the
Salutation? No. The Amens and the response to the Salutation are the peoples
part. The pastor should let the people respond.
The Salutation is a benediction of sorts that the pastor gives to the people. The
Salutation could be translated as The Lord with you. The verb is implied. The verb
is to be, but what form should it take? It very well could be The Lord is with you.
And he is with your spirit. So the Salutation might be a declarative statement
rather than a wish or desire.
The Biblical Basis for the Salutation in the OT
Boaz is walking by his field and he turns to the workers in his field, The Lord be
with you. And their response was, The Lord bless you. Its more than a greeting.
The Lord is with us. This brings to mind Jesus promise: I am with you always to the
end of the age. And there is Jesus promise in Mt. 18:20: Where two or three come
together in my name, I am there in the midst of them. So when we hear the Lord
be with you, we hear Lord as Immanuel, the God who is with us.

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Salutation Said with Open Arms
(Several questions from listeners.)
One point made in response to a question was that there is a gesture made by the
pastor when he says, The Lord be with you. He says it with open hands. This is a
gesture of embrace. The peoples answer back is also an embrace of the pastor.
Mutually they are saying, we are in this together, we are together here in the Lord.
The Little Prayers The Collects
The Collects prayed each Sunday are very simple.
The prayer begins with an address who you are talking to. And you can
learn a lot about what the church thinks about God in how he is addressed.
Many times the address will be amplified with a who statement. Maybe
something like, Oh God, who loves the world. It mentions some
characteristic about God that is the basis for what is going to be asked.
Then it asks for a gift from God. And generally speaking, these gifts that are
asked for are pretty huge.
Sometimes it will then explain how it will be of benefit to us so that we
might love and praise your name, or so that we might serve our neighbor.
Then it closes by saying this prayer is offered through Jesus Christ and with a
doxology.
If you dont know how to pray, the first thing you want to do is learn the Collect
form: address God, make your request, ask in Jesus name.
Objection to Collect: Not a Prayer from the Heart
Some people dont like the fact that these prayers are literally centuries old. They
want to pray their own prayer from the heart. Our response is that of Bonheoffer:
we need to learn to pray from the riches of Gods word and not from the poverty of
our own hearts. Thats what the Collects do. They are derived from Gods word.
Original Form
Way way back the Collect would prayed be like this. The pastor would say, Let us
pray. Then a deacon would say, Kneel. Then the people would pray silently, for a
while. Then the deacon would say, Stand. And then the pastor would continue
with the Collect proper and at the end the people would say, Amen. At some point
this form changed. The kneeling stopped and then the silent prayer stopped, so that
it went directly into the Collect.
Also note that all of the ancient Collects for a thousand years were 100% of the time
addressed to the Father. Its not wrong to pray to Christ or the Spirit, but in the

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official liturgy of the Church there is this picture: the people are gathered together
in the Spirit, joined to Jesus Christ, offering their prayers to God the Father. The
people of God come to him through the Mediator Jesus Christ.
Collects Assigned to Sundays
The Collects tie in with the themes for the big feast days. But for most of the church
year the Collects have very little bearing to the readings. They are simply the
people of God asking for a big thing from God. Yet the Collects are fixed to certain
Sundays in the year. They just happen to be assigned to those particular days.
Important Theological Content
The historic Collects are really important for their theological content. Many of the
ancient Collects were written after a very important Council at Orange that rejected
any form of semi-Pelagianism. What is semi-Pelagianism? Pelagianism is that you
can get to God on your own. Semi-Pelagianism is that you can get to God with the
help of God. This council said no. We are completely powerless to get to God. And
these Collects make this point very clearly. Here are some examples:
Collect for Epiphany 4: ... we cannot stand upright ...

Collect for Lent 2: ... you see that of ourselves we have no strength ...
Collect for Trinitty 1: ... and because through the weakness of our mortal
nature we can do no good thing ...
Collect for Trinity 3: ... with whom [God] nothing is strong and nothing is holy
...
Collect for Trinity 8: ... we cannot do anything that is good without you. By
you may we be enabled to live according to your will. ...
Collect for Trinity 12: ... by your gift alone your faithful people render you
true and laudable service ...
Collect for Trinity 14: ... because of our frailty we cannot but fall ...
Collect for Trinity 15: ... because she [the church] cannot continue in safety
without your aid, preserve her evermore by your help and goodness. ...
Collect for Trinity 18: ... because without you we are not able to please
you ...
Collect for Trinity 25: ... show your mercy to your servants that we, who put
no trust in our own merits, may not be dealt with after the severity of your
judgment but according to your mercy. ...
Collects are Always We Prayers and Not I Prayers

Note that these Collects are always we prayers. Why is that? And who is we?
The pastor [or cantor] is not praying for himself. He prays the prayer of the whole
church. Lets look again at a few Collects to see who is offering these prayers.

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On Christmas dawn: we your people.

Epiphany 2, Lent 5, Easter 3, Trinity 12: your faithful-people of faith, people
who trust in God.
Epiphany: us who know you now by faith.
Epiphany 1: your people who call on you.
Epiphany 5 and Good Friday: your family the church.
Lent 2: those who have no strength.
Lent 4: us your children.
Holy Saturday: we who await his coming on the third day.
Easter: we who celebrate with joy the day of his resurrection.
Trinity 1: people who in the weakness of their mortal nature cannot do
anything good.
...
What does all of this say? All of these are the churchs own self understanding.
When she prays in her Collects, she prays as the people of God, as Gods family, as
his faithful, as those who celebrate the great gifts that he has given. So when we
pray the Collect, we are not just praying for the people in the room. We are praying
the Collect for all those, who through the work of the Holy Spirit, have been joined
together through Baptism to the saving name of Jesus. This is the whole church, the
whole family of God.
And all of this is offered through Christ. He is our Lord, our Master. He took on our
flesh. And he is the only Son of the Father. So Father listen to this prayer that your
people, your family offer up in Jesus name.
So what is lost of the catholicity [universal] of these ancient prayers when churches
toss them out or substitute something else for them? They are so rich. There is no
single pastor who could come up with every week the rich prayers that request the
big gifts from God. We are too timid in our prayers. The church of God is not timid. It
asks for mega-gifts from God. Let me give two examples.
Almighty, everlasting God, always more ready to hear than we to pray and to
give more than we either desire or deserve, pour down on us the abundance
of your mercy, forgiving us the things of which our conscience is afraid, and
giving us those good things we are not worthy to ask, except in the merit and
mediation of Christ our Lord ... . That was from Trinity 11.
Similarly in Trinity 5. Oh God, you have prepared for those who love you
good things that surpass all understanding. Pour into our hearts such love
toward you that we, loving you above all things, may obtain your promises
which exceed all we can desire through Jesus Christ our Lord ... .
When pastors come up with stuff on their own, they are going to miss out on the
size of gift that the Collects are asking for.

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Amen
The Collect ends with the peoples Amen. When you read the NT, you realize that
the saying of the Amen is a big deal. The Amen is very similar to the peoples
response to the Salutation (And with your spirit). Both serve the same purpose of
saying, What you just said is ours. Were with you on that. Pastor, when you
speak or chant or pray, you do it for us too. We are praying this together. The
saying or singing of the Amen should be done firmly. Its saying, weve asked a big
thing of God and its no problem for him. He can do it and he will do it. Amen is
the peoples word to speak or sing, not the pastors word.
Session 9: The Old Testament Reading

Reading and Hearing the Scriptures
There are some Christian churches that do not read the scriptures at all in their
services or they might flash on the screen one verse. How is this possible? If you go
back to the OT, the people gathered together to read from the word of God. Gods
word is read out loud to the assembly. If you are going to a church where the word
of God is never read out loud, then get out of that church and find a real church.
The word of God is present everywhere in the liturgy in paraphrase or direct
quotation, but this is different. So far in the service the word of God has been used
by the people to speak back to God what he has first told us. I am thinking here
primarily of Confession where we confess we are sinners. Remember the command
in Deut. 6:4 the Shema: Listen/hear Oh Israel. So the people of God have been
gathered together in Gods presence and the book is opened and the word of God is
read out loud for the people to hear. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the
word of Christ. The Holy Spirit uses the word of God to produce and strengthen
justifying and saving faith in us. Many churches print the readings in the bulletin,
but more emphasis should be placed on listening to the word of God. Faith comes
by hearing.
Paul tells Timothy to attend to the public reading of scripture (1 Tim. 4:13). This
seems to be vital and indispensable to Paul. Is the reading of scripture
indispensable? Yes, it is absolutely indispensable. But honestly, if you look at the
Greek of that text, it just says reading. The assumption when translating is that
when something was read in the ancient world it was read out loud publically. For
instance, almost all of the NT epistles conclude by saying to have this read in the
churches. They were letters that were written to be read when the church was
assembled to receive the gifts of God. So in the Divine Service one of the primary

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things that happens is that God speaks and we listen. Reading the word of God out
loud is indispensable for the life of the Church.
The History of Reading Gods Word in the Divine Service
Historically the pastor didnt just randomly open the Bible and read. We see already
that the Jews had a system for reading the scriptures. The Babylonian system was a
1 year system and the Palestine system was a 3 year system of reading through the
Pentateuch so that Torah was read through in its entirety. We see in Luke 4 when
Jesus reads from the scriptures that he doesnt choose a Bible passage to read.
They handed him the scroll of Isaiah and he finds the assigned text for that day.
Before we continue talking about the systematic reading of scripture, we have a
question. Why would the NT Church read the OT in the beginning? Normally when
the NT refers to the scriptures they are referring to the OT. And all scripture is
given by the inspiration of God. Plus, the NT didnt exist yet. The Church knew that
the OT scriptures were all about Jesus. Historically in the synagogue there were two
readings with a psalm in between. The first reading was from the Torah, the first five
books of the OT, and it was the most important reading. And the second reading
was from the Prophets. When Jesus read and preached in Luke 4, he read the
second reading and preached on it.
Very early on in the Christian Church, the four Gospels were bound and traveled
together and the letters of Paul were bound and traveled together and the rest of
the NT that were also traveling together. So very quickly, the entirety of the NT
began to read along with the OT scriptures. So in its fullness they would have read
the Torah, the Prophets, the Epistle, and the Gospel. Sometimes Acts was read too
just before the Epistle. They had lots of Bible reading. Pr. Weedon then read a
passage from Justin Martyr from about 155 AD about worship at that time. Martyr
said that the Prophets and Gospels were read as long as time permitted. They had
long readings of scripture. Remember in the ancient world Bibles were rare because
they were all hand copied. The only time you got to hear the scriptures were when
you came to church. If they had heard a three minute reading like we do today they
would have felt gypped.
Listener question. Some of the old service books dont have an OT reading. Why?
And when did they stop reading it? We dont know exactly, but by the time the
western liturgy had taken the form that we know today, an OT reading was not
included, except for special occasions. We dont know why for sure, but it is
suspected that there came a conviction that the NT superseded the OT. They
probably thought of themselves as NT Christians.
Dont think that the only time the scriptures were read was during the Divine
Service. There were other services where it was read. The services of the hours

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would also have scripture reading. These services would have been sparsely
attended. Also note that the Sunday readings came from an everyday reading plan.
They used to celebrate the Lords Supper every day. So they had readings for every
day.
Pericopes and Lectionaries
Pericope literally means to cut around. It just means a selection of scripture to be
read on a given day. Early on the Church assigned certain scriptures to certain days.
This arose with the growth of the church year. The pattern followed early on was a
continuous reading book after book of the scriptures. But when a festival day came
like Christmas and say they were in the middle of reading Johns Gospel, they
wanted the reading to have a connection to Christmas. So they would go back to
John 1 and read about the Word becoming flesh. So by the fourth century it became
common to pick a reading that matched the feast day being celebrated. At first
these readings just interrupted the continuous readings. So it became common for
all churches to have the same readings for the same feast days. This was especially
true of the Gospel readings. Today we still see the remnants of the continuous
readings in the Epistle readings. From week to week the epistle reading would be
from the same book and not really have a connection to the Gospel reading. So the
lectionaries of the church have evolved from church history. So each Sunday
became known for a certain theme.
We currently have two main ways of reading through the Bible in the Divine Service
a one year or three year series. The one year lectionary is the historic lectionary
that goes back to the time of Charlemagne. At one time the Catholic Church, the
Lutheran Church, and the Anglican Church for the most part used the same one
year lectionary. And even though the OT was not generally read, the Lutheran
hymnal of 1941 had an option have an OT reading. In the one year lectionary, you
had the same readings on the same Sundays every year. For example, every
Christmas Eve we read from Luke 2. Well, it was the same for every Sunday. Each
Sunday had assigned texts to read. There was a price that was paid for doing this.
The Gospel readings were assigned and the Epistle readings continued to be
continuous readings and many times there was no connection between the two.
Also in the one year lectionary, there were huge chunks of scripture that are never
read in the Divine Service.
To address this, the Vatican introduced the three year cycle. Each year in the
three year cycle is determined one of the Gospels. In year A the Gospel readings are
primarily from Matthew. Year B is primarily from Mark with some fill in from the
Gospel of John. (Although John is used to some degree in all three years.) And year
C is devoted to Luke. In all three, the OT lesson was selected to highlight something
from Gospel reading for the day. The Epistles were more or less devoted to
continuous reading and did not necessarily connect to the other readings. The three

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year lectionary was proposed by Rome in the 1960s. And it did not take long that
the other liturgical churches followed suit.
But honestly, it was not done with a lot of reflection on the consequences for doing
so. Positively, the OT was read every Sunday. More of the scripture was read during
the three years. It was logically well thought out. But there were some things that
were lost. The number one thing that was lost was Biblical literacy. Now, that
probably sounds strange since more scripture is read in the three year cycle.
Repetition is the mother of learning. So if every year you have the same readings, it
gets drilled into your head and you remember them and learn them. Where with the
three year lectionary you only hear the readings once every three years, and if you
dont attend every Sunday, you may only hear them once every six or nine years.
That makes it harder to know them. The one year lectionary takes a smaller set of
Bible stories and nails them down and gives you a frame work for understanding the
rest of scripture. Another advantage for Lutherans is that each Sunday also had
specific music that tied in to the theme for that Sunday. There are advantages and
disadvantages to each of the lectionaries.
In trying to evaluate the three year lectionary, we must recognize that it has not
been around for that long - 50 years. That is a short period in church history. We are
still providing music for the Sundays of the three year cycle. Hymns are being
composed and written to fit the scriptures that are being read.
Two Things the Lectionary Does
Pr. Weedon says there are two things the lectionary does, protect the people and
also force the preacher into areas of scripture he would not normally preach about.
Pastors have their own pet peeves that they like to focus on. Using a lectionary
forces them to deal with texts that might ordinarily avoid. It guards the preacher
from his own laziness. The water of Gods word is rich and deep and fresh and the
pastor should dive into it. As we said, the lectionary also protects the people. Even if
the pastor bombs on the sermon, you still got to hear the word of God. You did not
walk away empty. You walked away with the gifts that God gave out.
Who Reads Gods Word?
It used to be a pretty standard practice that the pastor read the Bible readings. Our
service book allows that the first and second readings may both be read by lectors,
ordained or lay people. The Gospel reading is always reserved to be read by the
pastor. There are certain things that only a pastor does. The pastor gives the
Benediction, consecrates the Sacrament, and preaches the sermon. And only the
pastor reads the Gospel.
How Should Gods Word Be Read?

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Its not drama night, so the reader should not get carried away. But it should not be
read monotone either. The key to reading it is to have studied the text beforehand,
to have read it out loud many times. And as you read it, keep your eyes on the
pages and a finger in the book to keep your place. Read them as natural as
possible. Pastors should realize that they are reading the very word of God and
listeners should realize they are hearing the very word of God.
Session 10: The Gradual and Alleluia

Introduction
Sometimes the Gradual and Alleluia are considered filler and in modern worship are
left out of the service. But they are much more than filler. They are like a
punctuation mark. The congregation is putting a punctuation mark on the readings.
These chants that fall between the readings are the oldest in all of the liturgy. They
reach all the back to the synagogue practice. In the synagogue the Torah was read.
Then a psalm was sung. After that was a reading from the Prophets and then
another psalm was sung. It was a way of receiving what had just been read.
Building Up to the Gospel
With the reading of the OT, the singing of the Gradual, the reading of the Epistle
lesson, the singing of the Alleluia, we are building up to the reading of the Gospel.
The Gospel is a high point in the Divine Service. It is a mounting up of anticipation
and joy for the Gospel.
What Do We Mean by Gradual?
What the Gradual is is two verses of psalmody. The name comes from the fact that
it was sung from the gradus, which is a step by the altar. Usually it was a deacon
who sang this psalm from the gradus. And originally it was a responsive song. The
deacon would sing a verse and then the congregation would respond by singing the
refrain and that would continue for several verses.
This raises a question. Today everything has a place and purpose. We have the
altar/table, the place where the Sacrifice sits, the pulpit from which the Word is
preached, the font for baptisms, and the lectern from which Gods Word is read.
Where were the readings historically read from? The lectern we now have
historically grew out from the place where the cantor stood with the choir leading
the congregation in singing. The first two readings are read from the lectern. But
historically the Gospel was read out in the midst of the people or from the horns of
the altar. With churches oriented toward the east, the Gospel was read from the
north side of the altar. This was done because the north was always thought of as

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the place of darkness and the light of the Gospel was being carried into the
darkness.
So back to the gradus. It was the step from which this chant that we call the
Gradual was sung from.
Retaining the Psalmody
Why were NT Christians intent upon keeping the psalmody, like the Gradual? The
Psalter is on the lips of our Lord as he is on the cross. He prayed Ps. 22. He prayed
Ps. 31. He prayed the psalms as part of his own spiritual life. As the early church
read the psalms, they found Christ to be everywhere within the Psalter. So the
Psalter became the hymnbook of the early Christian church.
Some Examples of Graduals
As time went by, the Graduals were reduced in size. The responsorial nature of
them dropped out. So they became the psalm verses by themselves without the
peoples response. The choir or a cantor or a deacon would sing them to the people.
So for instance on Christmas Day, the Gradual is taken from Ps. 118: Blessed is he
who comes in the name of the Lord. The Lord is God. He has made his light to shine
on us. This is the Lords doing and it is marvelous in our eyes. Remember that one
of the Gospel readings for that day is from John 1 which speaks of Jesus being the
Light of men, shining in the darkness.
Another example comes from Epiphany, which celebrates the coming of the wise
men to Jesus with their gifts. The Gradual for Epiphany is based on Is. 60:6: those
from Sheba shall come. They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall bring good
news, the praises of the LORD. Arise, shine, for your light has come and the glory of
the Lord rises upon you.
Lets take another example from the beginning of Lent. The Gradual for Ash
Wednesday comes from Ps. 57: Be merciful O God to me, be merciful to me. For in
you my soul takes refuge. He will send from heaven and save me. He will put to
shame him who tramples on me.
There is also something that happens during Lent. In the place of the Alleluia, there
is something called the Tract, which means long. These are long psalm verses which
are read during the Alleluias spot. So for instance one of them is from Ps. 103: He
does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.
Do not remember against us our former iniquities. Let your compassion come
speedily to meet us. Help us O Lord O God of our salvation.
Christ in the Psalms

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Is there a two-way street here of sorts? Is there on the one hand a kind of
commentary here where scripture interprets scripture, where the Gradual interprets
the readings? And then on the other hand, we see the Gradual more clearly by
putting the words of the Gradual in the context of the readings thereby seeing the
real meaning of these OT words. We see the fulfillment of the OT words in the NT
readings. So for instance, the primary purpose of rejoicing over the day the Lord
has made is to rejoice over the day of Easter, the resurrection of Christ. Yes, all of
the psalms used for the Gradual have a Christological key. That is the heart of what
the Graduals do with the psalms; they help us see Christ in the psalms.
This Christological use of the OT psalms is different than the way most people and
churches see the psalms. They see them as artifacts from the past or great poetry
or a personal prayer book for a Christian. Most do not see the psalms as centering
on Christ, as being prayed by Christ, as being spoken by Christ, as being fulfilled in
Christ. Many churches and pastors dont have this understanding so they dont see
the importance of the Gradual and they just do away with it. Now as a result of
Vatican II the responsorial psalm was put back in between the first and second
readings in the Roman Church. Lutherans took note of this and made provisions to
allow the whole psalm to be used instead of the short Gradual. This is a wonderful
practice. Hearing the psalms in the context of the NT readings really helps us see
the Christological content of the Psalms.
What We Got Right and Wrong About the Graduals
Weve made some of the Graduals seasonal. So they are the same week after week
and therefore they do not tie in as well to the readings. It would have been better to
use the Graduals as they came down to us. On the other hand, weve made the
Graduals easy to sing so it doesnt take a trained musician to sing them. We have a
whole series of tones that can be used to sing the psalms. And they are all very
easy to learn, just three or four notes.
Luther made a decision when he wrote the German Mass to allow the singing of a
German hymn in the place of the Gradual. He did this because in the Latin service
the Gradual was very intricate and could only be sung by trained musicians. He
wanted to make it easy for the people to sing. But that led the church away from
singing the psalms as Graduals.
(A couple of listener questions about the Gradual.)
Alleluia
If you had to describe the psalms with a single word you might use the word
alleluia. It is a very common word used in the psalms. Alleluia is a Hebrew word
that means praise the Lord. But its not just an exhortation for others to praise the

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Lord. It is that, but it is also in and of itself an act of praise to God. It is a word of
overflowing joy.
There are times when we do not sing alleluia. During Lent, alleluia is not used.
Luther voiced a note of decent on this because he believed alleluia should always
be sung. He believed alleluia was the perpetual voice of the church. Not using the
alleluia produces a somberness to the service. One really notices when the alleluias
are missing. [The alleluia is missing from this season because during that time we
concentrate on the gravity and effects of our sin.] But then comes Easter and the
alleluia comes roaring back. At Easter it is said and sung over and over in the hymns
and the liturgy. Alleluia is the norm for the church. It expresses the churchs
overflowing joy. It is especially appropriate as we greet Jesus as he speaks to us in
the Gospel. Alleluia brackets the Gospel reading and they are a confession of the
real presence of Christ. Jesus is in the midst of the congregation speaking to them
the words of life and the church rejoices that he is among us. Wherever Christ is
present there is overflowing joy for his people.
Alleluia for the Words of Eternal Life
In John 6, Jesus followers are leaving him and Jesus asks the disciples if they too will
leave him. Peter responds with: Where else would be go, you have the words of
eternal life. We know and believe you are the Holy One of God. Why is this verse
appropriate for the Alleluia? That verse nails the fact that in the Gospel that is about
to read, we have Jesus words that lead to eternal life. Jesus came into this world to
give us a life that never ends. His words, which we are about to hear, literally give
us life. We couldnt sing better words at this time just before the Gospel. Setting
four of the Divine Service does this same thing with another verse: These are
written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God,
Alleluia! So in both of these verses we acknowledge that faith comes from hearing
the Word of God and that God gives life through his Word and faith receives life from
God. And the response of faith is praise to God.
How Gods Word is perceived and treated is very important in todays church. We
know that Gods Word is infallible and inerrant, that it is the holy and living voice of
God. But today many times Gods Word is treated in a very casual way as if it were
just another book or a newspaper. There is no reverence for the Word. So the
Alleluia and the standing for the Gospel show reverence for the King of the universe
as he speaks to us.
(Questions from listeners.)
Middle Age Sequences
In the Middle Ages a big development for the Alleluia was what is called the
Sequence. It is estimated that over 5000 were composed. May be some examples

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would help. Epiphany celebrates the coming of the wise men to Jesus. Pr. Weedon
then read a sequence for Epiphany. The sequence he read went on for almost one
and a half minutes and it explained the meaning of Epiphany. It was like a minisermon on Epiphany. In the Middle Ages these sequences were sung as a reflection
on the readings. Pr. Weedon read another example, one for Christmas. It lasted
nearly as long as the one for Epiphany and it explained the reason for and benefit of
the incarnation of Jesus. Unfortunately few churches, even though they retain the
liturgy, sing the Sequence. But there is no reason why these sequences could not be
brought back to the church.
Session 11: The Epistle and Gospel

Introduction
On Sunday morning we have the opportunity to listen, to listen to Gods Word as it
is read. Listening is the proper posture of faith, especially when God is present
speaking his Word to us. Today we will be talking about the reading of the Epistle
and Gospel lessons.
Reading Scripture is Essential
Why is it important that the reading of Scripture remain essential in the historic
liturgy? St. Paul taught us very clearly that faith comes from hearing, hearing from
the word of God. Faith is a gift that we receive from God but never possess. God
loves to continuously pour faith in to you and he does that through the hearing of
his word. Thats why God said in the OT, Listen Israel, Hear Israel. Its unfortunate
how much the Bible, Gods word, is read in churches today. The disciplined reading
of Gods word is the heart of the way that God deals with us as sinners. We cant
repent on our own. We cant keep faith on our own. We need his Law to expose our
sin and kill us. We need his Gospel to raise us up and restore us. We need both of
these things and they are delivered to us through the words of Scripture read to us.
These words have the power within them to slay the sinner and to raise him from
the dead. So speak the words and let them do their job.
Preaching is an indispensable part of the Divine Service. But you could not have
preaching without the reading of Gods word. The Church has many kinds of
services. And not all of them have preaching, but all of them do have the reading of
Gods word. The point of us coming together is so that God can address his people
and he does so through his word.
The Gospels Give Us Jesus Words

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One thing we have assumed in our discussions is that parts of the Scriptures are
classified as OT, Epistles, and Gospels. In the Jewish synagogues the Torah was read
first and then there was a reading from the Prophets. For them the Torah was the
most important reading. In our services we read the OT, the Epistle (the letter or the
Apostle), and the Gospel. The Epistle has words about Jesus and words about the
church, how we as forgiven sinners live together. The Gospel has some words about
Jesus, but the gospels are primarily the words of Jesus. In the Gospel lesson, Christ
himself speaks to us.
Some might say that all of Scripture is the inspired word of God, that its a level
playing field. But if we read the Scriptures, they teach us to lift up the words of
Jesus. Consider the following passages where Jesus makes incredible promises
concerning his words.
In Matt. 24:35 Jesus says, Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words
will not pass away.
In Mark 8:38 Jesus says, For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in
this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be
ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.
Jesus says in John 15:7, If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask
whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
In John 5:24 Jesus says, Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word
and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into
judgment, but has passed from death to life.
In John 8:51 Jesus says, Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word,
he will never see death.
John 14:23 has: Jesus answered him, If anyone loves me, he will keep my
word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our
home with him.
All the words of Scripture are important, but Jesus words are the most important.
The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit live in Jesus words. When his words find a home in
you, Jesus comes with them. That is the distinction weve made about the Gospel
from the Epistle.
The Epistles
The epistles are letters from the apostles to churches. And they sent the letters to
the churches for the express reason to be read in the liturgical assembly (in the
church service). They wrote them to be read as a whole to the congregation. So for
instance, this was Pauls way of preaching to the Corinthians when he couldnt be
there. So the church was and still is built upon the foundation of the apostles. What
the apostles teach still holds. The purpose of the epistles is to depict for us what it
means to be the church of Christ.

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We read Gods word in three parts (OT, Epistle, Gospel). If this were a train with
three cars, what would the engine be? The engine is the Gospel reading. The Epistle
is more independent. It doesnt always follow the same theme as the Gospel. The
Gospel and OT readings are usually tight together.
Ceremonies Elevate the Gospel
The OT and the Epistle are read from the lectern. The Gospel has a movement
associated with it. If it is read at the altar, it is read at the liturgical north side.
Reading from there is a symbolic taking of the light of Christ into the darkness of the
north. The older practice, which has become very prominent again, is take the
Gospel right to the center of the people and read it in their midst. When it is done in
this way, all the people stand and face the book, the place where Jesus speaks to
us. In some congregations there is a gospel procession. During the Alleluia, a
procession of the cross, candles, and the Bible go to the center of the people. All of
this is done to confess that Jesus is in our midst. Whenever the words of Jesus are
read, the people stand in reverence. All of the ceremonies used for the Gospel are
absent for the Epistle [and the OT reading]. These ceremonies are done to elevate
the Gospel.
Who Reads the Gospel Reading?
It is the traditional practice that only the pastor or a deacon read the Gospel
because that person is standing for Christ. The pastor represents the person of
Christ. He is there to be a mouth for Jesus. He is the person that the congregation
has called to represent Christ to the people.
Gospel Ceremonies Have Meaning
Why does everyone face the book when it is brought into the midst of the
congregation? What is that about? As we said, the reading of the Gospel is symbolic
of the presence of Christ in our midst. When the Gospel is read from the book, the
living words of Christ will be read. Think about this way. If Christ were physically
walking down the aisle to speak to the congregation, would anyone turn their back
on him? No, of course not. We would turn to face him. So that is what we do. Jesus
speaks to the people using the voice of the pastor.
Lets list the various ceremonies that accompany the reading of the Gospel.
The reader may offer a special prayer that the Lord might be in his mind, lips,
and heart as he proclaims the holy Gospel, that the Lord may speak through
the words read.
The reading may be accompanied by candles or even incense. If they are
used, they are used to confess that Jesus is presence as the Light of the
world, as sweet smell in a putrid sin-filled world.

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The book itself is a symbol. In the past the book was very ornate with gold
and jewels. Is that too much? If it is as Peter says, the words of eternal life, it
could not be too much. The words of the Gospel are the most precious thing
we have and these testify to it.
Sometimes the pastor will kiss the book after reading the Gospel. This is a
sign that we love the Gospel, we love this great gift that God is giving us.
As the Gospel is begun to be read, the first words are marked with the sign of
the cross. This reminds the pastor that he is about to speak for the crucified
one. Jesus is about to speak through him.
Some pastors will cross their forehead, their mouth, and their heart before
reading the Gospel, meaning Christ be on my mind, heart, and lips as I read.
This confesses that pastors in and of themselves are unworthy to utter these
holy words.
As soon as the reading is announced (the holy Gospel according to St. ______,
the __ chapter), the congregation sings, Glory to you O Lord. These words are
sung to Jesus. This makes it clear that the words about to be read are Jesus
words and not the pastors words.
When the reading is over and the pastor announces, This is the Gospel of the
Lord, the people respond with, Praise to you O Christ. In doing so they have
announced that they have just had a saving encounter with Jesus. Jesus has
come among us, has spoken to us, and we have received his life-giving
words.
As mentioned, when the pastor is done reading the Gospel, he says, This is the
Gospel of the Lord. Sometimes that is filled with some irony. The word gospel is used
in different ways. One way of using it is that the Gospel is Good News. But in this
phrase its used in a different sense. It simply means here that this is the reading
from the book that contains the Good News about Jesus.
Speaking on Tone
(They played an example of the Christmas Gospel from John 1 being chanted by the
pastor.)
Luther spent much time trying to teach pastors to do this, to speak on tone. There
were many rules on how to do it, especially for the words of Christ. There were
several reasons for chanting the readings. One reason is that it was unique. It said
something different is going on here, something different than what we encounter in
any other part of life. There were also practical reasons. It slows down the reading.
It writes the reading on the ears. It makes the reading accessible. In a bad
acoustical environment you can actually hear it and get it. When one speaks
normally in that type of environment it is hard to hear the words. To chant the
reading, it requires the pastor to read and practice it ahead of time.

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(Listener questions.)
Session 12: The Creed

Introduction
Why do we speak a creed, usually the Apostles Creed, in the Divine Service? How
does it fit in? What are we doing when we say the creed? We will be discussing all of
this today with Pr. Will Weedon.
How the Creed Became Part of the Divine Service
How did the Creed become a part of the Divine Service? The Nicene Creed and the
Apostles Creed both have their home in Baptism. They were migrated to the
service in the sixth century by a priest who only believed in one nature for Christ
instead of two natures (divine and human). He added the Creed to try and show that
he was orthodox in his beliefs (even though he wasnt). So his opponents also began
reciting the Creed in every Divine Service. And this practice spread throughout the
churches in the east. The place in the service where it was recited was different
than where we recite it today in the west. They recited it just after the prayers of
the faithful and just before the great Eucharistic prayer. That is how it came to be
used in the east.
About the same time in Spain it began to be used with the Lords Prayer as
preparation for Communion. In the prayer and the Creed the heart was purified and
the Christian faith was recited. But this did not catch on and spread in the west. It
would be a couple of centuries later before it was used throughout France. It was
recited after the Gospel reading. At that time it was not used in Rome. But with a
little pressure from the emperor it was introduced in Rome as well. So it took about
1000 years before the Creed had attained its spot in the Divine Service.
The Apostles Creed was a baptismal creed whereas the Nicene Creed is more
associated with the Lords Supper. In the Lutheran Church it became the practice to
allow either of these two creeds to be recited.
Before or After the Sermon
At times we use the creed before the sermon and other times after the sermon.
Should this concern us? No, because at either place it serves the same function.
When it comes before the sermon it is a reminder to the preacher that he better be
preaching this faith. When it comes after the sermon it should cause the people to
think, Did what I just hear in the sermon agree with faith we are confessing? Either
way the creed serves as a good fence. We will talk more about this later.

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The Apostles and Nicene Creeds
The Apostles Creed was the baptismal creed for the Roman Church. Its
characterized by its simplicity. Its language comes directly out of Scripture. It has no
repetition. For Lutherans, when the service did not include the Lords Supper (the
Service of the Word), the Apostles Creed was used.
The Nicene Creed is a baptismal creed for the Eastern Church. This creed has the
character of the Eastern Church. One of the differences between the Eastern and
Western liturgies is that the Western liturgy is very straightforward. The Eastern
liturgy is flowery and repetitious. Look at the first two articles of the Apostles Creed
and compare them to the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed has many more words.
One feature of Eastern creeds is to dwell on the oneness of Lord, faith, and baptism.
There are two words in the Nicene Creed that we should take note of. One was a
Latin word that the Nicene Council used to confess that our Lord Jesus was truly God
in his nature (being of one substance with the Father). Arian groups could say the
Apostles creed (they believed Jesus was the first creature God created) but they
could not say the Nicene Creed. Theological precision is a mark of the Nicene Creed.
The second Latin word has to do with the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and
the Son. In the west it is confessed that the Spirit proceeds from both. In the east it
is confessed that the Spirit only proceeds from the Father. There is still a division in
the Church caused by this.
Importance of the Words
Some might think that concern over where the creed is used and specific words in
the creed are just picking at nits. But to others it is important that all Christians
believe and say the same thing in the same way. Christians are not individualists.
This is the faith for which the martyrs shed their blood. Any kind of changes to the
substance of what is being confessed is a change to the substance of the faith. The
words matter. They are a faithful summary handed down by our forefathers of the
faith into which we have been baptized and which can save us.
The Creed as Inoculation and Antidote
The creed is inoculation in the sense that any Christian should be able to go to the
creed and compare it to what they are being taught. Does what they are being
taught agree with the creed? If it does not go with creed, which gives us the basics
of the Christian faith, turn and run away from it. As an antidote, it is something that
needs to be inside of us to help keep us straight. The creed is a roadmap for
understanding the Scriptures. We should understand them as bringing glory to God
and comfort to sinners.
Association of the Nicene Creed with the Lords Supper

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There is so much in the Nicene Creed about the nature of Christ that it seems to fit
perfectly with Christ coming to us in his body and blood in the Lords Supper. Is that
the logic behind this connection? This makes sense but when Lutherans received
the Divine Service the Nicene Creed was already in its place. It had already been in
this place for 500 years.
Reverence for the Great Gift
At the point in the Nicene Creed where we say and he was made man, some
pastors will bow or genuflect. Why is that? This is the great gift that God has given
man, that he himself took on human flesh in order to save man. This is a show of
reverence to God. And then what is kind of neat is when we get to and was
crucified for us under Pontus Pilate, those genuflecting stand back up. The reason
for this is when Jesus appeared before Pilate the soldiers mocked Jesus by kneeling
in front of Jesus the king. We do not want to mock Jesus.
The Athanasian Creed
The least used creed but one of the best creeds in this day of theological ambiguity
and doctrinal minimalism is the Athanasian Creed. This creed was probably not
technically written to be a creed. It was written to be a very easy to use and easy to
memorize clergy manual to help them stay orthodox in their preaching and teaching
about the Trinity and the person and work of Christ. It became known as the
Athanasian Creed because it so well captures Athanasius teaching about the
incarnation of our Lord Jesus. It is a very anti-Arian creed. For Lutherans, this creed
is recited on Trinity Sunday instead of the Apostles and Nicene Creeds. It is a very
long creed but it is very clear in its expression.
One part of this creed that Pr. Weedon likes relates to the question, How do I handle
Jesus saying the Father is greater than I? Some would say that this shows that
Jesus is inferior to the Father. There is a beautiful explanation of this right in the
Athanasian Creed. Concerning this it says that Jesus is Equal to the Father as
touching His Godhead, and inferior to the Father as touching His manhood. That is
a beautiful, simple, clear way of expressing our faith about this matter.
Why it is Important Not to Abandon the Creeds
Why would a church body ask its congregations not to abandon the creeds? This
came up as a resolution at an LCMS convention because some churches had begun
leaving out the creed or they replaced it with some statement that they made up.
These three creeds are listed in the Book of Concord as the ecumenical creeds.
These three creeds state the faith of the universal church. The recitation of these
creeds out loud in the Divine Service publically recognizes that this is faith that we
test all our life together against.

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It is the opinion of Pr. Wilken that a telltale sign that there is something going wrong
on Sunday morning when either the Confession and Absolution and/or the Creed is
left out or changed. When this happens it is very likely that there are some
theological problems occurring in that church. What must be remembered is that
the Lutheran liturgy is the prayed version of what we believe. So if a person is no
longer comfortable with what the Lutheran liturgy says, there is a really good
chance that they do not hold Lutheran beliefs. For instance, if the Confession and
Absolution are removed from the service then there is a good chance that you do
not believe in original sin. You would have a hard time saying that we are by nature
sinful and unclean. Or lets say you believe in universalism, that the gods of various
religions all point to the same god who saves us. Then you would not be able to say
the Athanasian Creed which confesses only one true God who is the Triune God and
it is only he who saves.
We were just talking about a pastor rewording the Creed. A natural question that
would come up would be, Didnt Luther do this? He wrote creedal hymns like, We All
Believe in One True God, that are not word for word versions of the Creed. This is
true, but one thing to remember is that Luthers concern in doing so was always
catechetical, how the Creed can teach the faith to the people. What Luther did was
make a rhymed paraphrase of the Nicene Creed into German. Luther was not writing
his own creed. Latin was still used in the Divine Service which few people
understood, so the people would have thought of this hymn as the German version
of the Nicene Creed, not a new creed made up by Luther. In the hymn Luther made
sure the words reflected that Jesus was one substance with the Father.
It Takes Good Works to Get to Heaven?
A user asked a question about whether it would be a good idea to change the end of
the Athanasian Creed where it sounds like it is saying you get into heaven based on
your good works. This is a very common question. But note that these words are
almost verbatim the words of Jesus from Johns gospel. The question to ask is, What
constitutes doing good? Johns gospel answers that question too. The answer is that
the work that God demands is to believe in the One he has sent, Jesus Christ. Also in
John 15 Jesus said, Apart from me you can do nothing. So the good works of the
Athanasian Creed are the same as those in Johns gospel, the fruits of living faith.
Other User Questions
Another listener mentions how Luther suggested praying the Creed and how easy it
makes praying. The pastors agreed.
In Greek the words for the Apostle Creed say, We believe, but in the Divine Service
we say, I believe. Given that the Divine Service is a corporate setting, wouldnt it
make more sense to say, We believe? Doesnt this hinder a true understanding? In

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the West this came into the church from the Baptismal liturgy where the use of I is
perfectly normal. Faith is a personal thing so we can each confess our own faith
together.
Why do Lutherans say, holy Christian Church instead of Holy catholic Church in the
Creed? This was the result of a peculiarity of 16 th century German when the liturgy
was formulated. They did not have a word for catholic. So the translation was a bit
of a paraphrase and we still use it today.
Session 13: The Sermon Hymn and Hymns

History of How the Hymn of the Day Became Part of the Divine Service
In American Christianity it has come to be expected that worship services will
include lots of hymns, songs, and music. It hasnt always been that way. There is a
history behind the singing of hymns. Hymns originally had their place in the
Churchs life in the daily office. The daily service would have a hymn that was
featured each day. What took off was Luthers idea of a hymn having a central place
in the Divine Service. What Luther did in the German service was replace the
Gradual with a German hymn or song. Then as time went on, Luther began
paraphrasing the Psalms making them into hymns. Luther began to realize that
hymns were a great vehicle for delivering Gods Word. The people really connected
to them and they proved to be a good teaching instrument to teach the faith. So if
you want to see Luthers theology, just look at the hymns he wrote.
He then started looking at the gospel readings for the day and composed hymns
around them. For one example there is a Sunday late in the church year whose
gospel lesson is the wise and foolish virgins. How does the church meditate on this
lesson? How does she understand it? A great hymn writer named Philipp Nicolai
wrote the hymn Wake, Awake, for Night is Flying. When you sing this hymn, it
literally puts you inside the gospel reading. This then became the function of the
Hymn of the Day. It literally connects the gospel reading just heard with the sermon
you are about to hear.
There were ancient hymns, they just didnt have a place in the Divine Service. They
had a place in the daily offices and the hours. So Luthers innovation was that
hymns were a vehicle for teaching that go along with the Gospel and the sermon.
And the hymn proclaims the Gospel and confesses the faith. Luther viewed the
hymn as the peoples preaching, the peoples proclamation out loud to themselves
and the world the incredible Good News of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ.
What is a Hymn?

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Someone might ask what is the difference between a hymn and a song? The NT
mentions hymns. Paul mentions them in Eph. 5. He refers to psalms (the Psalter),
hymns (canticles in the Scripture), and spiritual songs (compositions by Christians,
like in Phil. 2 or Col. 1). So what Paul calls spiritual songs we call hymns. Over time
in history, hymns became to known as rhymed compositions with some sort of
meter. So hymns are rhyming poetry texts set to music. Hymns are different from
songs in this way. Hymns are an expression of the faith of the whole congregation
and not the experience of an individual. Hymns are corporate in nature. Even when
they use I they are corporate in what they are saying.
Singing Hymns is Emotional
Pr. Wilken sees the singing of hymns as the proper place to express emotion that is
so very deep. Sunday morning is one of the most raw, emotional times of the week.
And thats because these are things of God; this is life and death. And since the
hymn is the expression of everyone, it is the proper place to express those
emotions. Its hard to describe to those who have not tasted it. For instance, its
Easter and the congregation is singing Christ Jesus Lay in Deaths Strong Bands.
This is a serious tune of war and it announces the victory and it fills you with such
peace and joy. Or its Good Shepherd Sunday and you are singing The King of Love
My Shepherd is. When the pastor looks out over the congregation as they sing, he
sees the tears on peoples faces. The hymns we sing express all the emotions we
feel. A hymn speaks the Word of God back to us and it does it with familiar melodies
and it provides an outlet for our emotions.
Jesus Lead Us in Singing
So its not one person saying, Its me and Jesus while I happen to be here with other
people. The primary thing happening is not me and Jesus, but Jesus and his body,
the church. One of the things that Dr. Kleinig points out is that Jesus is the chief
singer. One of the most amazing passages is in Zeph. 3 where Yahweh rejoices over
his children with singing. Jesus is the chief singer of the Psalter. He sings the psalms
to his Father. And Jesus pulls us, his body, into that song with him. He sings it for us
and with us. We should always keep Col. 3:16-17 in mind: Let the word of Christ
dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing
psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And
whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him. Jesus is the premier offerer of
thanksgiving to the Father and he invites us into that life of thanksgiving, which
consists in proclaiming the praises of God by saying and singing what God has
done.
There is one place in the Gospels that Jesus and his disciples sang a hymn [the night
he instituted the Lords Supper and suffered temptation in the Garden]. The

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placement of the hymn does not seem like a coincidence. Right before they left the
upper room to go to Gethsemane they sang a hymn. It was sung in preparation for
his temptation, suffering, and death. Jesus entered into the Toldoth sacrifice, which
is the sacrifice of thanksgiving. This sacrifice is offered to God when he has
delivered you from death. So Jesus does this before he went into death. Look at the
words of Ps. 116. He has delivered me from death. That is probably one of the
psalms he was singing before going to Gethsemane. So the Church, following her
Lord facing suffering and death, sings with him. In doing so, she receives the future
as a present gift right now. Like death had no hold on him, so it will have no hold on
us. Jesus faced death as an enemy who he had come to defeat and we face death it
in the same way. Jesus gives us a song of victory to sing even as he sang it. The
hymns we sing are songs of victory. They are also the songs of exile. We have been
temporarily displaced, but we are making our way home to heaven and as we do we
sing in anticipation of what will be.
License Used to Compose Hymns
In most of the liturgy there is little leeway in making changes since it is based
strictly on the Word of God and the institutions of Christ. But in the composition and
singing of hymns there is a certain license given that is not there in the rest of the
liturgy. As we try and put before people a particular part of the Bible, in hymns we
use the flowery language of poetry. In doing so we attempt to stir the imagination to
bring the singer and hearer into the Bible story. We are brought into the story as if
we were really there. The western liturgy itself is very straightforward. It keeps to
the basic facts. But its hymns take the facts and put people personally into the
story.
(listener question about music with the hymn.)
Examples of the Hymn of the Day
Lets take a look at some examples of the Hymn of the Day being intentionally
paired with the Gospel reading for the day. First lets look at the hymn for the
second Sunday in Advent in the historic series. On that day the Gospel talks about
Jesus return in glory. Pr. Weedon then read through the verses of the hymn Lo, He
Comes With Clouds Descending. This hymn just pulls us into the appearing of Christ
on the Last Day. We stand with all the saints and see him coming. We see that its
him as evidenced by his scars from his passion. After a hymn like this the preacher
might think to himself, What do I need to preach about? This hymn just told it
wonderfully.
Another example is from Christmas Eve. This hymn might not be known as well. It is
popular among German Lutherans. Pr. Weedon then read through the hymn All My
Heart This Night Rejoices (LSB 360). German Carrols like this are theologically deep

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and rich. 1 Peter says we have been made his people that we might proclaim the
excellencies of him who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. This
is how we do it. Hymns are peoples vehicle to speak to each other, to speak the
word of Christ that builds up and proclaims the Gospel.
Lets look at another pairing of the Gospel text with a Hymn of the Day Lord Thee I
Love with All My Heart. This goes with the story of Lazarus and the rich man. Pr.
Weedon then read through the hymn. You think about the angels coming for
Lazarus. In this hymn the angels come for you; it puts you into your own death. This
hymn expresses our great confidence in our resurrection. These are hymns that the
children of Zion sing as they go home. So they are good no matter what the
circumstances of life or death. A hymn gets you through them whatever they are.
Adding to the Treasury of Hymns
The Church receives a great heritage of hymns and is constantly adding to it.
Hymns are not replaced but added to. Because hymns are the peoples songs and
preaching, if you wholesale change them out you change the people. We dont get
rid of the old treasures and replace them with new treasures.
Listener question. If you use the historic one-year liturgy, should the sermon hymn
stay the same every year? Yes, thats the point of having a hymn of the day. It ties
directly to the Gospel for that day.
Session 14: The Sermon

Introduction
In most churches today there is usually someone standing before the congregation
talking or teaching the people. Are they preaching a sermon or just talking or
teaching? If they dont preach Christ and his saving work is it actually a sermon? Are
we at liberty to replace the sermon with something else?
Where Did Sermons Come From?
Where did sermons come from? Where did preaching come from? Probably the first
reference to a sermon in the Bible is Neh. 7. They built a big platform and from that
platform they read the sacred Scriptures. And they not only read the Scriptures but
they also explained what they read so that the people could understand.
By the time we reach the NT, we see that preaching in the synagogue was quite
normal. The Scriptures were read and then came a sermon. Jesus himself does this
in Luke 4. Jesus read the appointed reading from Isaiah, which talked about
preaching Good News to the poor, and then he sat down and began his sermon with

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Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. And later Jesus sent out his
apostles to preach the Gospel. Then when we turn to the book of Acts we see the
apostles doing what Jesus sent them out to do - preaching. They go to the
synagogues and after the Scriptures have been read they hold the prism of Christ
crucified and risen up to the Scriptures and they show that the Scriptures are all
about Christ. They used the Scriptures to proclaim the Good News about Jesus. We
see this repeatedly in the book of Acts.
The Prism of Christs Death and Resurrection
The prism is a good metaphor to use. You see a beam of light going into the prism
and then on the other side you see all the colors that are in the beam but are not
readily and easily visible. By shining the light of Scripture through the prism of
Christs death and resurrection, you begin to get what the OT Scriptures were
written for. You see the depth of the love of God for men which is the heart of the
proclamation of Good News.
So to summarize so far, the sermon is a public proclamation connected to the public
reading of Scripture. It was always an explication of the Scriptures in the light of
Christ crucified and risen from the dead. The rising of Christ from the dead is at the
heart of reading and understanding the Scriptures.
The Preaching of the Apostles
So is this true of the sermons that the apostles preach in the book of Acts? Is Christ
crucified and risen at the heart of their preaching? Yes. What the apostles always
seem to do in their sermons is to proclaim everything that God is up to in the person
of Jesus Christ and what God is doing through Christ centers in the forgiveness of sin
that delivers the kingdom of God to us. Take for example Acts 13. Paul is in the
synagogue in Antioch and he was asked to preach a word of encouragement. Paul
then goes on to explain the example of Israelite history in light of Jesus. And he
comes to this conclusion in Acts 13:38-39. Let it be known to you therefore,
brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and by him
everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed
by the law of Moses. Those verses are like a summary of all of Galatians and
Romans all in one sentence. Its not enough that it proclaim the cross of Christ and
his resurrection. It is the end result to which Christ died and rose again the
forgiveness of sins. Lets put it this way, the apostles preached in such a way that
their preaching was an absolution. They proclaimed that in Jesus Christ God the
Father had absolved the sins of the whole world. So they werent just preaching
about the forgiveness of sins, they were preaching the forgiveness of sins.
Preaching is Divinely Instituted and the Heart of the Office of Public
Ministry

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We took a short pause, but lets go back to the Scriptural roots for the sermon in the
Divine Service. Another famous sermon in the book of Acts is in Acts 10 where Peter
by divine intervention is summoned to the house of Cornelius. Pr. Weedon read Acts
10:37-43. It ends this way: And he commanded us to preach to the people and to
testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To
him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives
forgiveness of sins through his name. So they were to preach in order that people
might receive the forgiveness of sins. They are doing what Jesus told his disciples to
do at the end of Luke. He said repentance and the forgiveness of sins should be
preached in his name to all nations. Preaching is a divine institution. It is the heart
of office of public ministry.
Preaching in the Early Church
Since we are talking about the historic liturgy, was the preaching of a sermon a part
of the Divine Service from the very beginning? If you back to Justin Martyr around
150 AD, only 50 years after the book of Revelation was written, when they finished
reading the Scriptures, Justin Martyr says the pastor instructed the congregation
based upon what was just read. Their preaching looked forward to the end times
when Gods kingdom will come to its complete fruition and told the people this was
a gift for them in their lives starting right now.
There are many examples of sermons in the early church. In fact what we call the
commentaries of the church fathers are literally homilies. These are their comments
about the sacred scriptures just read in the Divine Service. So after the Scriptures
had been read, the pastor would go over what they just heard verse by verse and
explain it. The Scripture reading would determine the structure of the sermon and
the content of the sermon. The pastors job then was to make sure that the people
understand how the Scriptures just read applies to the peoples lives.
Was the reading that was often preached about the gospel lesson? Yes, but they
explained readings from other parts of the Bible as well. You can see where they
tended to preach through whole books at one time. And at some places it was not
unusual to have more than one sermon. If there were three or four pastors there,
they would take turns expounding on Gods Word. And when they got done the
Bishop would deliver his sermon. There was quite a hunger for the Word of God and
an appreciation for it. When they came together they came to hear it expounded
upon. Remember, not many people at that time could read. And even if they could,
they did not have a Bible at home to read. This was the peoples only exposure to
the Word of God. When you went to church you went to hear Gods Word and learn
about it. People paid close attention to it.
The Sermons Fall Out of Use

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How later did the sermon fall out of use? In the West a strong emphasis was placed
upon the Eucharist as a sacrifice. [This of course was and is a false teaching.] That
then became dominant over all other parts of the Divine Service. They believed the
priest was offering a sacrifice to God for the people in union with Christ. It was
believed at that time that seeing the Mass performed was sufficient. It was more
important than hearing a sermon. So this teaching about the Mass being a sacrifice
was not only wrong but it led some to question the need for a sermon.
The Return of the Sermon
Also important at that time was the fact that the services were being done in Latin.
This was not the common language of the people. So they could see what was being
done but they could not understand the service which was done in Latin. That was
the situation at the time that the Reformation took place. One of the hallmarks of
the Reformation was that the sermon be restored to its proper place. [And to go
along with this, the service was done in German, the language the people used and
understood.]
Listener Question
Some churches replace the word sermon with the word message. Please
comment on this. The word sermon means word. The word message kind of
goes with that. But Pr. Weedon prefers homily instead because it ties the pastors
hands to the text. Why is that? Homily by definition is a commentary on the sacred
Scriptures. So in a homily, you take what was just read and comment on it and
apply it to the lives of the people. Most likely changing from sermon to message
is probably an attempt to not sound churchy. Sometimes when people hear the word
sermon they get an attitude because they dont like to be preached at. So this is
why future pastors are taught homiletics in the seminary and not communications.
They are taught to preach a text and not just to be a good speaker. Being a good
speaker requires good oratory skills. If the people are impressed by a pastors good
speaking then at the end of the sermon they are thinking, Wow, he is a good
speaker. On the other hand, if the people hear a good sermon they will be thinking,
Wow, what a great God. Saint Augustine wrote a nice piece on preaching. Pr.
Weedon read part of it. Its called Catechizing the Uninstructed.
Preaching is a Necessity in the Divine Service
Is the view that preaching is a necessity the reason why the 16 th century reformers
revived preaching in the Divine Service? Yes. In fact in the West the sacrifice of the
Mass was being performed every day. Luther replaced this false teaching and action
with daily, disciplined Scripture reading and preaching in Matins and Vespers. Luther
laid out a complicated preaching system where on Sunday morning the sermon was
always on the Gospel reading and at Vespers the sermon was on the Epistle reading.

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Luther had all kinds of ideas on what, when, and how various readings should be
preached.
What Makes Good Preaching?
When asked the question, what makes good preaching, most people would answer
by saying the pastor must have good oratory skills and must be able to hold
peoples attention and unfortunately in our day and age be somewhat entertaining.
Most people think more in terms of oratory rather than homily. But good preaching
is more concerned about preaching strong Law followed by sweet Gospel. When the
Law is preached, the truth of our sinfulness is laid before us. The Law can very
devastating and for that reason there is the temptation to not use it in its full force.
But good preaching does. And when it is and is followed by the preaching of the
Gospel, the Gospel is so sweet and comforting to the sinner.
What is the relationship between oratory and homily? How can the Law and Gospel
be preached in such a way that it grabs peoples attention? The pastor has to have
personally experienced what he speaks about in both its Law and Gospel
dimensions. If this is the case, then the pastor is sharing with his people the
experience he has had with the Word of God. Good oratory in preaching is making
sure the pastors shortcomings dont get in the way of the people hearing and
experiencing the Word of God in both its Law and Gospel dimensions. The pastor is
a witness to the joy of the Gospel. Pastors have the privilege of sharing the best
news in the world death has been destroyed! Your sins have been forgiven! The
pastor needs to incarnate that Word.
Length of Sermons
What about the length of sermons? In some cases today there is long preaching
because that is what is expected. But that is not helpful. Church Father Chrysologus
had very brief homilies. Pr. Weedon read a few lines from one of his sermons about
death being an enemy that Christ disposed of. His sermons usually lasted 12
minutes, may be 15 minutes tops. [He is known as the Doctor of Homilies for the
concise but theologically rich reflections of his sermons.] Now Luthers sermons
were much longer. But you must realize that at his time Luther was desperate to reteach the Church. The Church was ignorant to the Scriptures at that time. (Sounds a
bit like today doesnt it.)
High Points
The Gospel reading of the first part of the service is a high point that corresponds
with the Gospel of the second part of the service, the words of institution. And the
sermon, which is another high point, corresponds with the distribution of the
Sacrament, when we receive the very body and blood of Christ. They are analogous
to each other. They are both the application of the words and promises of God to

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the people of God and both lead us to praise God for these good and gracious gifts.
This is the life that Christians live. It is a life where thanksgiving is constant and the
gifts of God are recognized one after another. The reading and proclamation of
Gods Word and the distribution of the Sacrament are high points that run in parallel
to each other. The church is in its fullness when the two of them are enacted
together. Historically Catholics have stressed the Sacrament over preaching and the
Protestants have stressed preaching of the Word over the Sacrament. It is uniquely
Lutheran to balance the two. Lutherans do not stress one over the other. Both of
them are means by which God is giving us the gift of the forgiveness of sins.
Preaching Outside Sunday Morning
The Church has always had preaching outside the Divine Service. We see an
example of this in Acts where Paul preached for so long that a man fell asleep, fell
from a window, died, and was raised from the dead by Paul. The Word of God
permeates the whole life of the Church and not just on Sunday morning. Lutherans
have daily prayer offices and they use them as the occasion for preaching the Word.
We now have a service in the hymnal of prayer and preaching. But none of these
other services were ever intended to replace the Divine Service, which includes
Communion, on Sunday.
The Sermons Place in the Divine Service
(This is a response to a listener question.) The sermon is never an entity unto itself.
It fits in and is connected with the rest of the service. The people have gathered
together. They have heard the Word as it was read to them. And then the Word has
been explained and proclaimed to them in the sermon. The sermon also moves the
people forward towards prayer and the reception of the Sacrament. The sermon has
not been haphazardly been placed in this spot in the service. Good liturgical
preaching connects people with the Word and moves them to the Sacrament and
towards a life of prayer and service to our neighbors.
Session 15: The Intercession and Prayers

Introduction
We think of prayer as asking God for something or saying something to God or
unloading our consciences to God. What about prayer as intercession? The Church
has always prayed in an intercessory way. It prays for the whole world. The worlds
welfare hangs on the Churchs prayer. We pray that God would care for this world in
every way. In addition the Church prays for itself, its members, the dying, and the
sick. Today we will talk about prayer.

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What is Prayer?
Lets start with an odd passage from Scripture. Job was feeling so depressed about
everything he had lost. He had striven to be a godly man but yet one disaster after
another happened to him. He doesnt even know how to talk to God about it. So in
Job 9:33 he says, There is no arbiter between us, who might lay his hand on us
both. So there is this picture of someone who stands between God and Job who
places his hands on both of their shoulders and brings them together. Job longs for
this. Later the prophet Zechariah talks about how on the Messianic Day God will
pour out on his people a spirit of grace and intercession, a spirit that pleads for
mercy, a spirit that pleads for the world. This is what Job longed for.
This comes to its greatest fruition inside the Holy Trinity. We will never get what
prayer is until we realize that it is God inviting us into his own inter-Trinitarian life.
The Lord Jesus is revealed in Scripture as the One who comes to lay a hand on God
and you. He intercedes for us. As true man, he knows every sorrow that we can go
through. He has been through every temptation that assaults us. As true God, he is
the Fathers beloved Son. He lays a hand on us both and intercedes for us. He
prayed for us while he was on earth, but even more now, so that the apostle Paul
could write in Romans 8:34: Christ Jesus is the one who diedmore than that, who
was raisedwho is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. The
eternal Son of God is interceding for us right now. It says the same thing in Heb.
7:25: Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to
God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. His
resurrected life is one of pleading with the Father for us. Thats why John in 1 John
calls Jesus our Advocate with the Father.
But there is more! Its not just Jesus who intercedes for us. Romans 8:26-27 says,
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for
as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for
words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because
the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. So the Son prays
before the Fathers throne and the Spirit prays from within us. Prayer is first and
foremost a conversation between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And we are taken into
this conversation.
The Churchs Intercession for the World and Individuals
So this is why the church prays in an intercessory way. The Church prays for itself,
but because it recognizes its place in this world, the Church also prays for the whole
world. There are two remarkable themes in the Prayer of the Church. And by Prayer
of the Church we are referring specifically to that prayer in the middle of the Divine
Service that follows proclamation of the Word in the sermon and before the
Eucharist is celebrated. After the Word of God has been heard, the Church pauses to

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literally intercede for everything. By the time the Prayer of the Church is done, she
has touched every human life on earth. A Russian saint once said, In the Prayer of
the Church, the Church takes the world in its hand as an apple and presents it to
God. But the Prayer is also intensely personal. In addition to praying for the world,
the Church lifts up individual members of the body of Christ or of individuals who
are not part of the body of Christ. We pray for Gods mercy on these people. So the
prayer is both universal in scope and individual in nature. If it fails to be both of
these things then it fails to be the fullness of the prayer that the Church intends it to
be.
Patterns of Prayer
There are some patterns used in the Prayer of the Church that have been used for a
very long time. Tell us about where they come from. In the western liturgy, at one
time the Prayer of the Church migrated to the Eucharistic Prayer. The Eucharistic
Prayer, which is part of the celebration of the Eucharist, became filled with all kinds
of intercessions and it kind of took the place of the Prayer of the Church. But
originally the Prayer of the Church came right where we have it today, following the
sermon. We see this very soon after the NT in the writings of Justin Martyr.
The ancient example that we have of how the Church prayed is called the Bidding
Prayer. Pr. Weedon then read through part of the Bidding Prayer. The prayer goes
subject by subject. First they would prayer for the whole Church of God. They would
go to their knees and individuals would silently offer prayers. Then they would stand
and the pastor would offer a collect (because it collected together all the prayers of
the individuals) for the whole Church of God. Then they would move on to a
different subject and follow the same pattern of individual silent prayer followed by
a collect prayed by the pastor. And they would do this subject after subject. The
Bidding Prayer classically had nine basic petitions. They prayed for the whole
Church, the ministers of the Church, the catechumens (those who are inquiring and
learning about the Church), all who are in authority, all who are in experiencing
tribulation, those outside the Church, the strengthening of Christians in living out
their faith, their enemies, and the fruits of the earth to be prosperous.
Pastor Weedon told how one year he decided to use the Bidding Prayer during Lent.
And when they did, they used the ancient pattern. It was different because normally
the pastor always leads the congregation in prayer. But following the pattern of the
ancient Bidding Prayer, individuals first silently offered prayers for each subject and
then the pastor offered prayer on behalf of the congregation. Following this pattern
helps keeps the people active in the prayers by having them personally intercede
for others. The drawback to it is obvious it takes a long time. So in case of Pr.
Weedons use of it, it took more than ten minutes for the Prayer of the Church.

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The length of the prayer is one of the reasons why the prayer over time migrated to
the Eucharistic Prayer. So one mark of Lutheranism was that it brought back and
separated the Prayer of the Church from the Eucharistic Prayer. They believed the
prayers were the prayers and they shouldnt be blended with another element of
the service. They were an important act that needed their own space and time.
These prayers then became known as the General Prayer or the Universal Prayer.
The Pastor Praying on Behalf, For, and With the People
Can you speak for a moment on the pastor praying on behalf of the people? This is
especially true of the western liturgy. We pray as one body and the body has one
mouth, which is the pastor speaking for the people. Yet throughout the liturgy there
are times of silence. Those are times when it is intended that everyone is praying.
After the silence the pastor prays on behalf of the congregation. But the
congregation prays along with the pastor and the congregation shows that they own
the pray by their Amen. By saying, Amen, the congregation is saying, Thats our
prayer too.
One more thing about the pastor praying. In pop American worship the pastor might
pray on behalf of the congregation, but its kind of an exhortation prayer, like a Let
Jesus into your hearts prayer. Or the pastor prays for something that is extremely
particular. What is the danger of prayers being too particular to a time and place
and people? We should think about John 2 as an example of how to pray. Jesus and
his disciples were invited to a wedding and they ran out of wine. Jesus mother
noticed that the wine ran out. What did Mary do? Does she go to Jesus and tell him
exactly what to do? No. She came to Jesus and laid the need on him. She simply
said, They have no wine. And then she told the servants to do whatever Jesus asks
you to do. Mary teaches us how to pray. Take your need to Jesus, but dont tell him
how to fix it. He is a little smarter than we are. Just bring the need to Jesus [and
trust he will take care of it.] This is what the Church does in its intercession. Some
people are troubled by this. For instance if someone is sick. They expect that we
would pray that that person would be healed. But we pray, If it is your will. They
say, Thats not a prayer of faith. But what takes more faith? To say, Do it my way O
God, or to say, O God your way is always best.
Praying for the General Welfare and Particular Needs
We talked about not dictating to God how to address our needs. The collects of the
Prayer of the Church reflect the need but there is also a promise from Scripture. Talk
about that. St. Paul taught us that in Jesus Christ all of Gods promises are Yes. In
Jesus the love of God has embraced the entire world. No person is excluded in our
prayers. And when we pray for them, we pray from the riches of Gods Word and not
from the poverty of our own hearts. So you wont hear any prayers like, We/I just

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want to thank you ... or We/I just ask you.... There is no comparison of what
comes from us versus what comes from Gods Word.
Here is an example of a prayer from the Lutheran hymnal:
Almighty and eternal God, worthy to be held in reverence by all people
everywhere, we give you humble and sincere thanks for the enumerable blessings
that you have bestowed on us without any merit or worthiness on our part. We
praise you especially for preserving for us your saving Word and the holy
Sacraments. Grant and preserve for your holy Church throughout the world purity of
doctrine and provide faithful pastors to preach your powerful Word. Help all who
hear that Word rightly to understand and truly to believe it. Send laborers into your
harvest and open the door of faith to those who do not know you. In mercy bring to
repentance the enemies of your Church. Grant them amendment of life. Protect,
defend your Church in all tribulation and danger and strengthen us and all fellow
Christians to set our hope fully on the grace revealed in Christ. Help us to fight the
good fight of faith so that in the end we may receive the salvation of our souls.
Then Pr. Weedon read a prayer for the government. ... We never fail to pray for the
government. He then read another prayer for the government. ... The point in
praying for the government is so that there will be peace and order in order that the
Church can go forward in her work unhindered. Several of these petitions that we
pray are commanded by Christ to his apostles.
If you listen to the prayers, you will hear the universality of the prayers, for the
general welfare of people, for the sick and needy, for those who are distressed and
facing sorrow. And then you will hear particular people with their specific needs
prayed for. We place before God the world and its needs as well as ourselves and
our needs.
These prayers are Trinitarian, offered in Christ and through Christ, in the Spirit, to
the Father, gathering up the needs of the entire world, the Church, and the little
community gathered together at this place at this time. Its all encompassing.
Nothing is left out.
The Old Adams Aversion to Prayer
The Prayer of the Church, praying for all these things, takes a long time. The old
Adam has a hard time with prayer. If sin is the bending of us inward on ourselves,
then prayer is the unbending. Its looking at the needs of our neighbors, taking
them to heart as if they were your own. This does not come naturally for us. Our
prayer lists can become very long. And we lose patience. Yet every person on the
list is important. Every person is dear to someone. And their sorrows are our
sorrows. And we take their needs in Jesus to the Father by the Spirit.

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How do you respond to someone who says, the sermon is a high point and the next
high point is the Eucharist. The prayers seem like a low point or a break in the
action. Well, thats your old Adam speaking to you. The old Adam thinks about,
What do I get?, instead of thinking about the great privilege we have as the royal
priesthood of God united by Christ, filled with the Spirit, and joining in the interTrinitarian conversation that asks for great mercy for the world.
Pr. Weedon talked personally about prayer. As a teenager, he heard Gods promises
and he prayed for certain things and it seemed as if it didnt work. So he stopped
praying. Later it became a real eye opener for him when he stopped trying to
understand prayer and he just did it. At that point prayer became alive for him in a
way that it never had before. You can go through some very hard times but when
you pray you have joy and peace. But we still have the old Adam living within us, so
we get bored or lazy in our prayer life. But that is the life that a Christian leads. It is
a life of prayer. And prayer does not need to be understood. It just needs to be
done. And as we do it, we grow in our love for it. Pauls admonition was to pray
without ceasing. The Prayer of the Church is a springboard for doing just that. Look
at the book of Acts. What are the apostles always doing? Their praying. They turned
to God for everything. For instance, the apostles were beaten for their testimony
about Christ. What was their response? They asked God to give them continued
boldness in confessing Jesus. And when Peter was arrested in Acts 12, they prayed
for Peter and God answered that prayer by sending an angel to open prison door
and let Peter out.
Listener Questions
Listener question: Are we praying mainly to increase our love and dependency on
God or are we praying to change Gods mind. No, we are not praying to change
Gods mind. We pray because he has commanded us to pray. And then we pray
because God has promised to hear us when we pray in Jesus name. And so we pray
with confidence. Rather than trying to figure out prayer, just do it and trust the
promise of God. Its not complicated. As Luther said, the Father has invited us to
address him as children address their dear fathers.
Listener question: Is there any history of imprecatory prayers in the history of the
Church against your enemies? There is certainly a history in the Church of prayer
that the enemies of the Church might not prosper in their designs to destroy the
gospel of the Church but that instead they would be given the gift of repentance
and be brought to life. Luther was very much into the psalms and you can see in
some of his hymns how he speaks against the Churchs enemies. It has a place but
we must always remember that Christ taught us how to pray for our enemies. He
teaches that we pray that God would bless them and bring them to repentance.
All of Sunday Morning Could Fall Under the Category of Prayer

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The entirety of the liturgy might be considered the Churchs public prayer. Its her
prayed confession of the faith. Because of this, the Church recognizes that she
doesnt do it only with the people that can be seen there at that place. The entire
Church in union with Christ by his Spirit prays. One common ending to the Prayer of
the Church recognizes the saints who have died and gone to heaven as well as all of
the saints scattered around the world. We are not individuals, but one body in
Christ. We stand with all those baptized into Christ and who trust in his perfect,
finished redemption.
Session 16: The Offertory and Offering

Introduction
Some people say that taking an offering is a necessary evil because the church
needs money to operate on. But that is not a Christian way of thinking about the
offering. We would say this only because we dont believe that the money we have
is his but ours. And since it is ours, the church shouldnt have anything to do with
our money. So lets reorient our thinking on the offering.
Giving Out of Joy Rather Than Obligation
Pr. Weedon please respond to this idea that the offering is a necessary evil so that
the church can pay its bills. Sometimes we are almost embarrassed by the offering
as something we have to do. But throughout the OT and NT and in the early Church,
the offering was a time of joy. Whether it be for the construction of the tabernacle or
the temple there was an overflowing giving from the people of God that was the joy
and delight of their hearts. When we understand that giving is not a burden but a
part of the gospel itself, then we are set free. Historically there has been an
offertory procession where the gifts are brought forward with the people singing
with great joy. That was the original purpose of offertories. They were hymns of joy
based on the fact, as St. Paul says, that God loves a cheerful giver.
Biblical Roots of Giving
Lets take a look at the biblical roots of the offering. Giving an offering is an
elemental thing that man, even in his fallen state, feels he needs to do. This first
shows up just outside of Eden after the Fall with Cain and Abel. There is a
recognition that even though God created this world, the world has become
disconnected from God and needs to be given back to him, to put it back in his
hands. It could also be said that you will not understand Jesus Christ and what he
does unless you understand the idea of offering. What our Lord Christ is about all
the way from his conception to his resurrection and ascension is giving the world

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back to the Father. Jesus came into the world in order to complete the perfect
offering. His whole life is one big offering, giving the world back to his Father.
We mentioned Cain and Abel. This is an often misunderstood story that both men
came with an offering but one was insincere and one was sincere. What was the real
difference between the two? In Hebrews we hear that Abel gave his offering in faith
and the Cain didnt. What you cannot lose sight of in this story is the substance of
the offerings. Abel offered the death of an animal. He offers that which dies so that
he can live. It is a fact that human beings go on living by taking dead things and
eating them. We take the life from them in order that we might have life. Thats the
only way we can go on living. I suppose this is true of plants as well, but there is
something much more profound about the death of a lamb as opposed to the death
of broccoli. The lamb has the breath of life in it and this lambs life is sacrificed so
that people can live.
The offering then of Abel becomes the first in a long line of bloody sacrifices that all
point forward to and culminate in the one perfect offering, the offering of Jesus who
willingly and purposely laid down his life for the world. God says in Exodus and
Deuteronomy, You shall not appear before me empty-handed. Even fallen man
understands this. But the faithful recognize that the sacrifice they bring is
completely inadequate. There is no sacrifice we can bring that will reconnect this
world back to God. There is only one perfect sacrifice that does this, which is the
sacrifice of Christ, the sacrifice he offered once and for all on the altar of the cross
for all of humanity. That means then that all of life is an offering. Remember that
Paul urges us to make our bodies a living sacrifice. In Jesus, all of life becomes an
offering to God. So it is unthinkable that the church would gather each week and not
have an offering.
Another Purpose God Provides for His Servants
There is another element to this that is formally stated in the OT. The priests lived
off of these offerings and sacrifices. And Jesus is clear on this and so is the apostle
Paul that the laborer is worthy of his hire. Therefore it is Gods intention that those
who serve in the office of the ministry live off of these gifts and sacrifices of Gods
people. Its in the OT and it continued in the NT. It is the pattern God set up to
provide for his servants. Gods forgiving presence in this world is established
through the temple, through the priests, in this system and it takes sacrifice on the
part of people for it to continue to exist. In the OT you have this idea of a tithe, of
10% going back directly to God. So the first 10% of your income was not even yours
to manage. It just goes directly to God. The other 90% is under your management.
The Offertory Create in Me a Clean Heart

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Returning from a commercial, we heard the offertory as sung by the Concordia
choir. It is the offertory that many of us grew up with (Create in Me a Clean Heart). It
comes directly from Psalm 51:10-12. Why is it used for the offertory? It doesnt say
anything about money or gifts. Ps. 51 has long been associated with preparation for
Holy Communion. The song comes from the heart of this psalm. It goes on to say in
that psalm that the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite
heart, O God, you will not despise and open my lips, and my mouth will declare
your praise. This psalm recognizes that the sacrifice that God wants can only be
produced by God himself in us. So this psalm begs God for the ability for us to be
offered to him as a pleasing and acceptable sacrifice. He is going to have to create
a clean heart in us. It is a beautiful recognition that in the offering, what is running
behind the offering and offertory is that we ourselves are being given to God but
only God can accomplish this giving.
Back to the Tithe
Lets go back say some more about the tithe. The tithe predates the Law. The tithe
first shows up with Melchizedek, when Abraham gave him a tenth. So this is way
before Moses and the giving of the Law. And then it shows up again with Jacob at
Bethel where he saw the ladder up to heaven. Afterwards he swears that he will
give God a tenth. Where does this come from? Its part of natural law. Later Mosaic
law codifies it, as it does with many other natural laws. Take a look at Mal. 3:8-12:
8
Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, How have we
robbed you? In your tithes and contributions. 9 You are cursed with a curse,
for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. 10 Bring the full tithe into the
storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the
test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you
and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. 11 I will rebuke
the devourer[b] for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and
your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the LORD of hosts. 12 Then all
nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the LORD of
hosts.
The context of this (from Mal. 1) is that the people were bringing trashy offerings;
they were offering him the leftovers of their animals. Also in chapter 1, Malachi
prophesied that Gods name would be great among the nations and he would be
offered a pure offering. This is a picture of the Messianic age and it is an age that is
characterized by a beautiful, pure offering. (And its only pure because its offered in
and through Jesus Christ. That is how all things get to be purified.)
And the tithe isnt just in the OT either. On one occasion Jesus was chewing out the
scribes and Pharisees and he said to them, Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier

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matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have
done, without neglecting the others (Mt. 23:23). Notice that he said at the end
without neglecting the others. Their tithing was ok, but they didnt do the harder
things that the Law of God demands of us.
So it is very important to say to Christians, Just take 10% of your income and hand it
over to the Lord. Some object: Hey thats a lot; I live off of that. Yes, thats the point.
But we really live from the Lord. The tithe provides for the care of the Church. God
uses the Church to provide his life-giving gifts to us. When we receive the Word of
God [the written word and the Word made flesh] we receive life and are prepared to
suffer and die and rise with Jesus on the day when he returns. Your giving to the
Church enables the Word to go forth and do its job.
Through Creation God Provides

Going back to Mal. 3:10, it says, Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there
may be food in my house. When he speaks of food, he really means food. Food
gives life. In the OT and even in the NT they gave things in kind. This included bread
and wine. In the NT bread and wine were used in two ways. They were used for the
Lords Supper in that Sundays service and they were used to feed the clergy, the
poor, the widows, and the orphans in the following week. The Church literally lived
on the offerings that the people brought.
The best way to think about how this worked is to think in sacramental and
sacrificial terms. Sacramental is that which God does for you. Thats the primary
job of the pastor. He is there to administer Gods gifts to his people. Sacrificial is
the gifts that the people give to God. In the Divine Service the people sacrificially
give to God for the care of the poor, needy, and clergy. It was historically the job of
the deacons to administer the peoples sacrificial gifts and to care for the poor. In
caring for the poor, they provided food and offered prayers on their behalf. So if you
picture it this way, in the ancient church you came and brought your gift to church.
And when the time came for the offering, people would literally walk up the aisle to
the altar to present their gifts to God. It was the deacons who were standing there
receiving those gifts and who would then administer them.
So the offering of the stuff of this world is a confession of the goodness of the
creation itself. Even though this is a fallen world, it is still Gods world about which
God had said, It is very good. Even in its fallen state, its Gods good world. We offer
back to God the stuff that comes from his creation. Included in the offerings were
bread and wine, which would be used in the Lords Supper. Weve said this before
but we will say it again because it is important. [This is how the entire series started
out.] Idolatry is M worship and true worship is W in form. Idolatry starts with man

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who then tries to manipulate God. True worship begins on top with God giving a gift.
So in the case of offering bread and wine, God first gave the gift of grapes and
wheat. Then we make bread and wine out of them and present them back to him.
And then by his Word, he joins the body and blood of Christ to the bread and wine
and gives it back to us. We then respond with a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving.
Our whole life is one of thanksgiving and praise. So the very goodness of Gods
creation is enshrined in the act of the offering.
Giving Our Whole Selves
So at the beginning of this discussion about the offering, we said its hard to get by
the feeling that the reason we give is because the church needs this money to
function. But the reason we give is much bigger than this. This is expressed in the
General Prayers of the Church. Pr. Weedon read a couple of examples. The point is
that what you put in the offering plate is a sign of your whole life. Together with
fruits of the world that we offer, we offer our souls, bodies, hearts, minds, and
talents. He purchased us so that we can give ourselves back to him in and through
Jesus. Thats why Jesus came, to purchase us and give us back to God. In the
offering what is being offered is our whole lives back to God, to his will, to his
purpose, to his kingdom, for the sake of the risen life that is in Christ, reigning
through us here in this world.
In the offering we offer back to God what we have first received from him in the
first place. He gave us all these things. And if we give these things back to God and
to our neighbor, we know he will care of us. We dont have to worry about it.
Knowing this we ought to give cheerfully. Yet we normally fall far short in the
cheerful department. Pr. Weedon gave an example of a time when he gave the tithe
but not cheerfully because he didnt know if he would have enough money for the
rest of the month. As it turned out, they did have enough. God did provide. The
moral of the story is that God can and does out give us. He gives us more than we
need for life so when we give, we should give cheerfully.
Our offering reflects our way of living. Think about the widows mite. She offered
everything she had 2 pennies. She could have kept 1 penny, she still would have
been giving 50%! Also remember the widow of Zarephath. At first Elijah only asked
for a glass of water. But then he asked for a cake of bread. He was asking for her
and her sons last meal. And she did it! We dont live by bread alone. We live by the
promises of God. The same thing happened with Jesus disciples. With a great crowd
of over 5000 people, Jesus told them to feed the crowd with their lunch, 5 loaves
and 2 fish. In giving what they had away, they ended up with 12 baskets of leftover
bread.
So the offering is much bigger than giving away some of the stuff you have. This is
what Jesus himself does. He gives himself away; he gives away his life. He did this

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to give to the world eternal life. So his message is, Dont worry about giving away
your stuff. Ive got more to give you than you could possibly hold. Pass it on.
Luther once said, Ive held many things in my hands, but I havent managed to keep
any of them. But everything I put in Gods hands, I still have. What is he saying? We
have this fear that tries to clutch and hold on to the stuff of this world that we have,
as if it is our life. But its not our life. As Job said, Naked I came from my mothers
womb, naked I will return. When we give to others to help them, we are putting it in
Gods hands. That good and kind thing is never lost. It is an eternal thing held in
Gods hands. It is something we will be rewarded for on the Last Day. It is letting
Gods love flow to others through us.
Were not just talking about throwing money at people. Were talking about giving of
yourself to people. The nature of sin is for us to be curved in on ourselves. God
remedies this by giving us in Jesus everything we need. This frees us up to give
away what we have and ourselves in service to our neighbor. We have received
Gods love in Christ therefore we can respond in kind by loving others. The life God
gives us is eternal life. Thats why the martyrs can even give away their lives. The
life God gives us in Christ is so big that it cannot be snuffed out by death. It will
continue on into eternity.
How the Offering Works with the Lords Supper
The placement of the offering in the Divine Service just before the Lords Supper is
perfect. If the Lords Supper is the next high point in the service, the offering is part
of the climb to that peak. The offering and the Lords Supper work together. In the
prayers and offering the Church offers the world back to the God who created it. He
then in turn, through the words of his Son in the Eucharist, gives it back to us. The
offering is the hinge of the Divine Service. His gifts to us then cause us to respond in
thanksgiving. This goes back to the W worship we talked about. A better way of
looking at the offering is not that we offer ourselves to God but that Jesus offers us
to the Father.
The Offertory
We sing Create in Me and What Shall I Render to the Lord as offertory songs. We
have only a short time left in this program. Historically these songs were propers.
They changed every week depending on the theme for the service. The offertory
was the song that was sung as the people brought up their gifts to God. But over
time for Lutherans the offertory has become more fixed and is now part of the
ordinaries rather than the propers. In the offertory we recognize that what we give
to the Lord is what he has first provided to us. As a result we give him our thanks
and praise for the wonderful gifts he has given us.

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Session 17: The Preface and Proper Preface

Introduction
We began today by hearing the preface to the Eucharist being sung. It has been
described as being a dialog between the pastor and the congregation.
The Preface Goes Way Back
This part of the Divine Service goes all the way back to the time of the apostles. The
first documentary evidence of these sentences being used in the form that we use
them is in the Apostolic Tradition of saint Hippolytus. He was very conservative and
probably was conserving a tradition that easily could have reached back 50 or 100
years. That puts us back into the time of the apostles. The words were literally what
we use today:
The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit.
Up with your hearts.
We have them in the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give him thanks and praise.
The Preface was thought of from the beginning as the beginning of the Eucharist,
the big act of thanksgiving of the Church. Sometimes it was called the Action; it is
the thing that the Church does. The Church gathers together and gives thanks. We
dont see the Preface specifically in the Didache, the earliest document we have.
But this document is the next oldest document of the early Church that we have.
And then we have in many documents that follow the Apostolic Tradition the Preface
in this form. There was a slight difference in the Preface in the eastern part of the
empire than the western part. In the east the Preface did not begin with, The Lord
be with you. Instead it began with the words from 2 Cor. 13:14: The grace of the
Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with
you all. And the congregation responded with, And with your spirit. The rest was
the same.
Now we said the Preface was not explicitly in the Didache, the document that goes
back to the Apostles. Yet its clear that the early Church from its inception
recognized that in the Lords Supper we not only speak the words of Jesus and
receive the true body and blood of Christ, but also respond to that great gift with an
act of thanksgiving. The word eucharist means thanksgiving and Eucharist is

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probably the oldest name of this action of giving thanks. So the Lords Supper is
about receiving the gift with thanksgiving. In the Eucharist we recognize that we
have been given everything in Jesus and all that is left for us to do is to give
thanksgiving.
Distinguishing Between Sacramental and Sacrificial
How important is it here to make a careful distinction between a sacrificial (action
toward God) act and sacramental (action toward us) act? Pr. Weedon had spoken to
Dr. Kleinig a few days before this program and Dr. Kleinig said that we are erring if
we think of sacrificial action as us doing the action. In Trinitarian theology, it is the
Father who sends the Son and the Son who sends his Spirit. It is the Spirit who
brings you to the Son and the Son brings you to the Father. So who is doing all the
action here? It goes out from God and then goes back to God. God is the One who is
doing it all. So it is Christ who is pulling us into the act of praising and thanking God.
We dont want to get too far ahead of ourselves, but sometimes churches put
Christs words of institution right after or with the Preface. In those words Jesus said,
Do this in remembrance of me, or, Do this for my remembrance. Some see a double
meaning in these words. Jesus is saying not only that this is how he is to be
remembered by us [sacrificial] but also how, like Yahweh of the OT, he remembers
[sacramental]. When God remembers, he acts in mercy. Christ is active here from
beginning to end, but that doesnt leave us out. Jesus is the great High Priest who
renders thanks and praise to the Father. And he moves us to thank and praise God.
So then our thanks and praise is offered in and through Jesus to the Father.
Why the Preface Has Been Retained for All These Years
Weve discussed that the Preface comes from the beginning of the NT Church. But
we have not discussed why it remains in this unchanged form and why it is done
over and over again in each Divine Service without change? The key to
understanding this is that it expresses something that is so utterly true about the
Churchs life [it is a life of thanksgiving] and she lacks the capacity to say it in a
better way. It is tragic when the pastor rattles through the words of institution and
the body and blood of Christ are given out, but there is no giving of thanks. That is a
deformed Eucharist. It is missing part of what Jesus told us is the great joy of this
feast.
Moving From the Service of the Word to the Service of the Sacrament
Lets talk briefly about moving from the Service of the Word to the Service of the
Sacrament. The elements for the Lords Supper (the bread and wine) come from the
offerings of the people. So the preparation of the Table is that which occurs during

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the offering. So the Table is set. But its one thing to set the table and its another
thing to call the people to the Meal. The Preface calls the people to the Meal. It calls
people to give thanks to God for the wonderful Meal he is about to feed us. So the
table is set during the offering and the Preface is the call to come and eat.
The Words of the Preface
We said a little bit ago that it is a tragedy when this call for thanksgiving (the
Preface) is left out, many times just for the sake of time. Stop and think about that
for a minute. We dont have time today to stop and give thanks to you God! Isnt
that is what time was made for?!
The Preface begins with the salutation. The pastor says, The Lord be with you.
And the congregation responds with, And also with you. Then comes the second
part of the dialog: Lift up your hearts. We lift them to the Lord. What does it mean to lift up
your hearts? Remember what Jesus said? He said where your treasure is, there your heart will be
also. So its a call to the people: Remember Gods people, your treasure is in Christ Jesus. Dont ever
forget that. And the peoples response is one of agreement: Yes indeed, Jesus is our treasure. A NT
seek the things that are above, where Christ is,

seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on
things that are on earth. You died and your life now is hidden with Christ in God. So
this is a call to the people to come to the table where your life is, where Jesus is
present. Jesus, who is above all, is coming here to us in this Meal.
reference similar to this is Col. 3:1: ...
This is very important. When we hear, Lift up your hearts, we have a tendency to
think we need to raise our attention to highest heaven where Jesus dwells, to direct
our attention upward. But in actuality, when the pastor says, Lift up your hearts,
he is inviting the people to acknowledge the real presence of Christ among them.
Christ, who is above all, comes down to us in this Meal. [Therefore we set our
attention on the bread and wine in which Christ is present for us.] We dont do
anything to get up to him; rather, he comes to us, heaven comes to earth. So in the
Preface we are asking the people to lay aside all of your earthly cares, for the Savior
is coming to you here and now with blessing.
This then leads us right into the next line of the Preface. The pastor says, Let us give
thanks (make eucharist) to the Lord our God. And the people respond with, It is meet and right so to
do. The word meet here means what is fitting, worthy, and appropriate. This is important to
remember. First things first. Is. 51:3 has something important to say about this. To understand this,
you have to use the parallelism of Hebrew poetry. It says the same thing in different words. Is. 51:3
reads as follows:
For the LORD comforts Zion;

he comforts all her waste places
and makes her wilderness like Eden,
her desert like the garden of the LORD;

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joy and gladness will be found in her,
thanksgiving and the voice of song.
Here Yahweh says he comforts his people, making them like the Garden of Eden.
And what is Eden like? It is a place of joy and gladness, thanksgiving and song. In
Eden everything was a gift of God and so the thanksgiving to God never ceased to
ring out. But then came the Fall. And Adam plunged the world into thanks-less-ness.
St. Paul then describes the fallen condition of the world in Romans 1:21: For
although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but
they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. So a
mark of the fallen world is that it does not give thanks or it does not give thanks to
God. A person gives thanks when he is given a gift. He thanks the one who gave it
to him. The world does not recognize that God is the Giver of the gift.
In the Preface, the Church is proclaiming that a gigantic gift is being given by God,
like a boulder being thrown into a lake and the water splashing [thanksgiving] all
the way up to heaven. The thanksgiving is all consuming. Thats expressed in the
next line by the pastor: "It is truly meet, right, and salutary, that we should at all
times, and in all places, give thanks unto Thee, O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty
Everlasting God. We give thanks to the Father and we give thanks through Jesus
Christ.
This thanksgiving that the Church does is not just something the Church does for a
period of time. This is what the Church will do for all eternity. Thanksgiving never
ends. It is a part of the paradise of heaven.
What we will discuss next after the break is how the next part of the service has
differed from time to time. What used to follow the Preface was what was called the
Eucharistic Prayer. It was one big statement that ended with everyone receiving
Christs body and blood. And now weve broken it down a bit. Well talk about how
this happened next.
Eucharistic Prayer vs. Proper Preface
The ancient church would move from the act of thanksgiving in the Preface to a
prayer of remembrance of Jesus, which included the words of institution and a
prayer for the Holy Spirit and for worthy reception and many other things
(Eucharistic Prayer). And the people would give a big Amen at the end of this
prayer. This is still the form of the prayer in the eastern churches and it does not
vary.
The western church took a completely different track. In the west the Prefaces could
change. And early on it changed every Sunday and was specific and proper for the
day itself. Also in the west early on the Prayer of the Church disappeared and was
shifted here. And because of that, in place of the act of thanksgiving there were

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words of intercession. It was a fine intercession but it was not a good giving of
thanks. It was in the wrong place. The eastern church stayed focus on thanksgiving.
What the Lutherans did, which is decried by some, was to make sure the Gift itself
was not overshadowed by the thanksgiving. Lutherans said, the thanksgiving is
great but lets make sure we dont lose sight of that for which we are giving thanks.
They made sure that the words of institution were not encompassed within a
sentence of thanksgiving. They were set off on their own. So an analogy that is used
by Lutherans is that the Gift (the Lords Supper) is the diamond and the
thanksgiving (the Preface) is the setting for the diamond. Diamonds are not carried
around loose. They are put in a setting so they can be displayed. The two go
together. And when you show people a diamond ring, they dont say what a lovely
setting. The setting is a lovely setting when you dont even notice it because your
eye and your attention are drawn to the diamond, the Gift of Christs body and
blood. Over time the number of Proper Prefaces has been narrowed down so that it
does not change every week. Over the centuries they became boiled down to 9 or
10 standard Proper Prefaces. Lately that number has increased some.
The Beginning of the Proper Preface
The Proper Preface itself has an interesting structure to it. It always starts out the
same way: It is truly meet, right, and salutary that we should at all times and all
places give thanks to you O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty Everlasting God. This is a
powerful, stunning, and radical statement. It is saying that what is natural in an
unfallen state is to be thankful everywhere all the time. And the thanklessness that
controls humanity, where we try and hold on to what we have and not live in the
confidence of Gods gracious giving, is not what we were made for. So at this
moment in the service the Church proclaims what we were made for. We were made
to receive these gifts from God and offer him thanks and praise through Jesus
Christ. This is a thanksgiving that is not meant for one little moment in church. This
thanksgiving is catholic; it is universal. It applies to all of life. Its such a huge gift
that thanksgiving is never out of place in life.
The Heart of the Proper Preface
Going back to the diamond analogy. At this point in the service, it is like the Church
is taking the diamond and holding it up to the light and watching it sparkle. When it
is moved under the light, it sparkles in different ways as it refractors the light. That
is what is happening in the Proper Preface. During different seasons of the church
year different things are emphasized and different aspects of Gods gift of Jesus are
emphasized in the Preface. Pastor Weedon then read through various parts of Proper
Prefaces. The mood of all of these prayers is great joy and they all center on Jesus.
Advent-Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world who
will return and who calls sinners to repentance.

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Christmas-The Word made flesh, the revelation of Gods glory.

Epiphany-Through Jesus God has made known what has been hidden from the
world. If you want to see Gods glory shine, then look at Jesus.
Jesus Baptism-Jesus is revealed as the Christ by the Fathers voice and Holy
Spirits descent upon him.
There are many more Prefaces we could look at.
In all of these Prefaces we are giving thanks to the Father through Jesus and for
Jesus. This is appropriate because it is the Father who gave the Son out of love for
the world. And it is the Son who then gives the world back to the Father. The Holy
Spirit, being sent by the Son to us, works in us and brings us to Jesus who in turn
brings us to the Father. Where is the Spirit in the Preface? The Spirit is like the air we
breathe. We dont tend to focus on the air. The Spirits job is to focus us on Jesus. If
we are focused on Jesus then the Spirit is there doing his job.
The Beauty of the Chant Tone
Upon returning from a commercial break, we heard the Proper Preface chanted as
recorded on a CD called Lutheran Service Book and Hymns from Concordia
Publishing House. Hearing this recording reminded Pr. Weedon about the beauty of
the distinctive chant tone used. It is strange because you can feel it pushing toward
the boundary of joyous exalted song and yet there is a sense that there is a feeling
that it is restrained or held back. Praise of God is the Churchs native tongue. This is
what life was meant to be. This is what language and speech are for.
Two More Proper Prefaces
Pr. Weedon wanted to draw our attention to two more Proper Prefaces. The first
Preface he highlighted had words and thoughts that came from a prayer from the
early third century. The second Preface highlighted was a Swedish one that Pr.
Weedon liked very much.
Clearing Up Luthers Stance on the Proper Preface
Some people say Luther got rid of the Proper Preface so why cant we? In one
instance Luther combines the Preface with the words of institution. But note that
within this Luther addresses and exhorts the people to thanksgiving. Thanksgiving
was built right into it.
How the Proper Preface Ends
The Proper Preface ends with: Therefore with angels and archangels and all the
company of heaven, we laud and magnify your glorious name, evermore praising
you and saying [which leads right into the Sanctus]. God wants one choir made up
of angelic and human voices. He made us to sing with the angels; this is what we
were created for. So we join in the song of praise sung by the angels and by those

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who have gone before us and have died in faith. The mark of being alive is not that
we breathe, but by the fact that praise and thanksgiving is coming out of your
mouth (See Ps. 115). In the Supper we are given a life-giving gift. And now that in
the Preface that life comes forth out of us in the form of praise and thanksgiving. We
began the Preface by saying, we should at all times and all places give thanks to
you O Lord. And now we end the Preface by joining the angels and saints in praise
of God. The life of the saints is a life of continual praise and thanksgiving of God.
Next Time
The end of the Proper Preface leads right into the Holy, Holy, Holy. We will take a
look at the Sanctus next time.
Session 18 The Sanctus

Introduction
To begin with we heard the Sanctus from Divine Service 3 sung. Today we will talk
about the Sanctus, an explosion of praise. We talk about a body of doctrine. All
Christian doctrine is connected together and hangs together like the parts of a
human body. They dont exist isolated from each other. The same is true of the
Divine Service. It has many parts but it is a body where its parts are interconnected.
This then is true of the Sanctus. It is anchored to what comes before it. It is actually
the end of a sentence that we left unfinished in the Proper Preface.
Anchored in the Proper Preface
Since the Sanctus is anchored in the Proper Preface, lets take a brief look back to
where we ended up last time. The Preface focuses on thanksgiving, a sacrifice of
thanksgiving that is to be offered always and everywhere through Jesus Christ to
God the Father. The Proper Preface ends with: Therefore with angels and
archangels and all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify your glorious
name, evermore praising you and saying.... It is then at that moment that the
Sanctus enters in. At this moment we join in a cosmic song of praise that is being
sung by the angel and archangels. Ps. 145:21 says, My mouth will speak the praise
of the LORD, and let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever. This is the song
of praise for all times and all places.
The Biblical Root of the First Part of the Sanctus
The Church never improvises anything. We dont make things up on our own. When
we say this praise is being offered to God by angels and archangels, there is a

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biblical root to this. We are singing the song that we have heard the angels sing
first. There are two songs of the angels in the Divine Service, the Gloria and the
Sanctus. The origin of the Sanctus is found in Is. 6. To understand this, picture Isaiah
in the temple doing the liturgy as he always does. And all of a sudden God pulls
back the veil. That which is unseen becomes seen by Isaiah. The hidden reality of
heaven that was always there but that no one sees, God let Isaiah see. We read
about it in Is. 6:1-3:
6 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and
the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim [spirits of fire]. Each had
six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.
3
And one called to another and said: Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is
full of his glory!
And what is striking as we continue reading is that its like an earthquake. The
foundations shake and the temple fills with smoke. And Isaiah says in verse 5: Woe
is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a
people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts! Isaiah
thinks he is going to die. He who is unclean has gazed upon the perfection of God.
For Isaiah this was judgment day. Its all over for him. But then there is this
wonderful moment. One of these seraphim flew over to Isaiah with a burning coal
that he had taken with tongs from the altar. The seraphim touched Isaiahs mouth
with the fiery coal. The seraphim said to Isaiah in verse 7, Behold, this has touched
your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for. Even though he a
sinner had seen God, this will prevent him from dying. He lives and will be able to
fulfill the commission of God for his life.
This is the original setting for the Sanctus. It lives on in the NT as can be seen in the
book of the Revelation of Saint John. John doesnt use the word seraphim but he
describes these four living creatures that are very strange. They have a bunch of
eyes both in the front and in the back. One of the creatures is like a lion and one like
an ox and one like the face of a man and the fourth is like an eagle. What these
living creatures do is fly around the throne of God with their six wings (that reminds
us of the seraphim) and they continually cry (similar to Is. 6): Holy, holy, holy is the
Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come. So both Isaiah and John see
heaven where the angels continually cry out to God, Holy, holy, holy. And the
Church literally takes up that cry and makes it her own.
When we come back from the break we will talk about the word holy and the fact
that it is repeated three times. We need to rightly understand holiness. Isaiah had a
true picture of holiness. In encountering Gods holiness, Isaiah knew as a sinner that
he was as good as dead. Many times we sing these words without thinking about
them. But we are singing about the very essence of God. When we sing about Gods

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holiness, we sing about what made Isaiah tremble before God. We are in effect
standing in Isaiahs shoes. In the Divine Service we are standing before the holy
God just like Isaiah did. We will also discuss the glory of God that the angels sang
about in Is. 6.
Holiness and Glory
Earlier in the Gloria we sang, You only are holy. You only are the Lord. When we
confess the holiness of God, we confess that which sets him apart from us. We are
talking about him being completely without sin, that he is entirely pure. He is bright,
shining love. But to a sinner that holiness strikes terror. This is really brought home
when you face God face to face. To bring this home, think about this way. Think
about electricity, raw electricity. Electricity is good. It can heat your house. It can
give you light. But what happens if you grab raw electricity? It fries you. Not
because its bad. It does it just because it is electricity. In Scripture God is pictured
as an all consuming fire. And if we sinners come into contact with holy God, we are
doomed to be consumed by the fire of his holy presence. To sinners this brings
complete terror.
Luther was brilliant on this point. (Pr. Weedon read a quote from Luther.) When the
Church comes into the presence of holy God she confesses that only he is holy. She
confesses this with a triple holy. The text in Isaiah speaks of the whole earth being
filled with Gods glory. The Church sings that not only is the earth filled with Gods
glory, but so also is heaven. So what is the glory of God that fills heaven and earth?
Recall how the writer of Hebrews says that Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God.
Paul says in Eph. 4 that he who descended is he who ascended far above all the
heavens that he might fill all things. So when we sing that heaven and earth are full
of your glory, we are standing before the Father saying that everything everywhere
is Jesus, that his presence fills everything, that he is the glory of God. Jesus in the
flesh is the glory of God.
One tradition of the Divine Service puts the Sanctus after the consecration. In that
tradition the consecrated elements are raised and at the same time the Holy, Holy,
Holy is sung. This confesses that the holy One is here among us in the flesh and
blood of Jesus to bless us. We are watching his glory fill the earth when his body and
blood are presented on the altar. Now someone might object and say, That doesnt
look glorious. Its bread; its wine. Its as glorious as Jesus hanging on the tree or
laying in a manager as a baby. Its a hidden glory. Remember we talked about the
electricity. As electricity is wrapped up so as to not harm us, so God wraps himself
up in the humanity of Jesus in order not to harm us.
Blessed is He Who Comes in the Name of the LORD

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(We heard the Sanctus from Divine Service 1 sung as we returned from a
commercial break.) The second half of the Sanctus comes from Ps. 118. When Jesus
entered into Jerusalem, the crowd greeted him as the long awaited Messiah. They
greeted him with the words of Ps. 118:26a: Blessed is he who comes in the name
of the LORD! Here is the sentence from Ps. 118 within its context.
25
Save us [Hosanna], we pray, O LORD!

O LORD, we pray, give us success!
26
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD!

We bless you from the house of the LORD.
27
The LORD is God,
and he has made his light to shine upon us.
Bind the festal sacrifice with cords,
up to the horns of the altar!
28
You are my God, and I will give thanks to you;

you are my God; I will extol you.
29
Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
for his steadfast love endures forever!
Seeing it in context makes it clear who Jesus was and what he had come to do. He is
the King who has come to save and he saves by being a festal sacrifice. Jesus was
bound to the altar of the cross. Jesus name means Yahweh saves. Jesus is Yahweh
in the flesh who has come to answer the prayer: Save us, we pray, O LORD. He has
come to offer himself on the cross for the world.
The Sanctus began with Holy, holy, holy. Only God is holy. Here is the holy One, God
in human flesh, riding on a donkey. He has come to Jerusalem to offer himself as a
sacrifice in order that we might be saved. With the sacrifice having been made to
save the world, he comes to us now in the flesh, to offer us the benefits of his
sacrifice. And so we now greet Jesus, the Holy One, in the same way as the people
did when he entered Jerusalem. We sing, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the
name of the LORD.
Remembrance Involves Past, Present, and Future
Sometimes at this point in the song, pastors and people will cross themselves. What
is this all about? The marking of oneself with the sign of the cross is a recognition
that the One who is coming to us now in the name of the Lord is the One who was
crucified. Jesus is coming to us now. The entirety of the service has been rushing us
to the remembrance of Jesus which is constituted by the words of institution. The
holy One, who if approached by sinful man would be destroyed, has found a way

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through the flesh of Christ to come to us so that we can have a share in his eternal
life and salvation through the forgiveness of our sins. This is what the entire Sanctus
is confessing and driving towards. The song begins and ends with Hosanna, save us
now. And this is what Jesus is doing in the Supper.
So this is far more than just mere remembrance of past events. We are recognizing
and confessing that these events are being brought forward to us and that there is
salvation on that table. One of the mysterious things about the Supper is that the
future is brought back into the present and the past is brought forward into the
present. And both are given to us as a gift. All of this is bound together in Jesus, the
One who has come and the One who will come again. Jesus, authorized by the
Father, comes to this world for you to give you life.
Holy Things and Holy Space
The gift of Christ to us, that is, his body and blood, are called holy things by the
Church. We think of a line from the old eastern liturgy where, after the consecration
of the elements, the pastor would hold up the bread and wine and say, The holy
things for the holy ones. The peoples answer to this is like that of the Gloria: There
is only One who is holy. There is only One who is Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the
Churchs holiness. That is the only holiness that the Church has. Holiness is a gift
from the Lord. It is not an achievement by us.
This then relates to why the Church has consecrated space for the holy things, holy
activities, and holy words. In consecrating this space, we are saying, This is his
space, not our space. We use this space in the way that he would have us use it.
While God has created all space and it all belongs to him, this space is sacred. It is
set aside by the Church as an embassy to Gods kingdom that will reign over the
world on the day of Christs return. In this place the joy and light of Gods kingdom
already streams in to the lives of people gathered there. The light of the future
shines on Gods people here and now.
(This is an aside, but this why the national flag has no place in the chancel. This is
Gods kingdom. His kingdom will subsume all kingdoms into itself. The chancel area
is territory that belongs to God. Things happen in this space that make no sense to
the world. In this space water connected with Gods word gives eternal life. In this
space bread and wine become body and blood. In this space people come together
who have nothing else in common and become family. At this place the future with
God is breaking in to this world.)
Variations in the Wording of the Sanctus
Luther wrote a version of the Sanctus called Isaiah, Mighty Seer. Some consider it a
master piece. In it Luther paraphrases the call of Isaiah. Others have done similarly
as Luther but their words are different. This is normal when translating from one

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language to another. Two people can say basically the same thing when translating
but use different words. That is what happens with the many versions of the
Sanctus. For instance some versions of the Sanctus will use the word Sabaoth.
Others will use the word hosts. They mean the same thing.
(Returning from a commercial break there was a listener question: How would you
explain the Sanctus to a person who is exploring Lutheranism for the first time?
Heaven has come to earth. Heaven is wherever Jesus is present. And Jesus is
present here and now in body and blood. For this great gift we join the angels in
praising God.
Another listener question: Why is the Sanctus worded differently in Divine Services
1 and 4? We started discussing this before the break. So we will continue with it
now.)
As we said, it is a different way of translating the text. In Divine Services 1 and 2,
the Sanctus is translated into more contemporary English. Divine Service 3 is the
old setting of the Sanctus. In Divine Services 4 and 5 the Sanctus is a rhymed
paraphrased. This is a common practice. It makes them easier to sing and easier to
remember. This is what Luther did in his master piece, Isaiah, Might Seer.
There is a little different rendition of the Sanctus that goes way back to the Middle
Ages. In the first rendition found in the LCMS hymnbook, the Blessed is he is not
repeated three times. Instead it is repeated twice and then it has Marys son that
cometh in the name of the Lord. This anchors it into the incarnation. But during the
Easter season it has Blessed is he twice followed by Pascal Lamb who comes in
the name of the Lord. Both of these are an expansion of the Sanctus to tie them
into the season of the church year.
Skipping the Sanctus to Save Time
We live in a time ruled culture. So some people have said for the sake of time, Lets
just get to the Lords Supper, the important thing. So they skip over the Preface and
Sanctus because people dont want the service to go so long. Pr. Weedon relayed
that his home church where he grew up was like this. They went from sermon, to
general prayer, to Our Father, to the Words of Institution, to Pax, to the distribution.
So they cut out all of the thanksgiving of the Preface and Sanctus. Thanksgiving is
what the Church is all about. Thanksgiving is the air that the Church of Jesus Christ
breathes. To cut out the thanksgiving is to cut out what God created time for. And
what a powerful moment the Sanctus is where heaven and earth are joined together
in one big choir singing one song to the great and holy God. It is robbery when a
pastor thinks his sermon is so important that it takes up the time when the
congregation could be singing thanksgiving and praise with the angels.
A Moment of Great Joy

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The singing of the Sanctus is a moment of joy. It is a moment of an explosion of joy.
We are there in the presence of the Holy One and we already know that the body
and blood of Christ are there for us. The Holy One is not to terrorize us, rather he
comes to bring us blessing.
The Blessed One
Speaking of blessing, we left that out. When we sing, Blessed is he, the important
thing to pick up is that he is the Blessed One, the One promised to Abraham who
would bring blessing to every nation of the earth! The blessing that the Promised
One would bring would be to undo the damage done by sin.
The Sanctus as Preparation for the Gospel
Two final questions. We talked about the mountain peaks of the liturgy. Weve talked
about the sermon already and were coming to the next one, were climbing the
mountain of the Lords Supper. They are not identical. Each has a majesty of its
own. It has been said, At least if the sermon is lousy I still get the Gospel in the
Lords Supper. How true is this? The Lords Supper is all Gospel. There are some
parallels between the two. Earlier, as we prepare to hear the Gospel read and
proclaimed, we sang the Alleluia. Now at this point in the service, we prepare for the
Gospel of the words of institution by singing the Sanctus. The Lords Supper is the
Gospel. Forgiveness is not just an idea. Forgiveness is a reality concretely delivered
by flesh and blood put into your mouth.
The Place of Emotion in Lutheran Worship
One final question from a listener. Pr. Weedon whenever you speak about worship
you have an excitement and an emotion in your voice. I have the same emotion
while the rest of the congregation seems stoic. What is the place of emotion in
worship? You just spoke about joy Pr. Weedon. Yes, if our minds are open to seeing
what is actually happening in the Divine Service, the result is overflowing joy. Ps. 16
says, In thy presence is fullness of joy. If you have a bunch of people who are
joyless, there is only one conclusion. Theyve forgotten in whose presence theyve
been gathered. His gift of forgiveness and new life is being poured out in that Divine
Service for our blessing. When you stop and think about the great God who made all
things, who we put to death on a cross, comes in absolution to us to wipe our sins
and give us a share in his own unending life, I dont get how you cant be terribly
excited! He is going to stoop so low that he will come and enter into you giving you
the very body and blood he assumed from the blessed virgin. This is heaven on
earth.
Session 19 The Lords Prayer and Words of Institution

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Introduction
The Lords Prayer and the words of institution are Christs words. And the words of
Christ takes center stage at the most important peaks of the historic liturgy, at the
Gospel reading and the Lords Supper.
Keeping The Words of Christ Together
Much of the historic liturgy used by Lutherans is the same as other branches of the
Christian Church. Most of the liturgy is the same right up to this moment. At this
point in the liturgy across history Lutherans have tended to follow Dr. Luther in
removing all human words and leaving only those spoken by Christ himself.
Pr. Weedon is frequently asked, what is a good book to read about the liturgy? One
book in particular that he recommends highly is, The New Testament in His Blood: a
Study of the Holy Liturgy of the Christian Church, by Dr. Burnell F. Eckardt Jr. In this
book he gives us a marvelous treatment of the holy liturgy. In the book he writes
about the subject we are talking about, the keeping of the Lords Prayer and words
of institution together. He says these two things are the only two formulae that
Jesus gave the Church and commanded her to use. Everything else revolves around
them. Because they are Jesus words and because he commanded them, they are
the heart of Christian worship.
The liturgies used by other denominations at this point of the service usually have a
massive long prayer of thanksgiving, remembrances, and intercessions. This prayer
is called the Roman Cannon and it was, up until the mid twentieth century, prayed
silently by the priest. In Luthers view this prayer cluttered up the Lords Supper and
he removed it. Luther authored two services. In one service in 1523, since the priest
was already saying out loud the Preface, he joined the words of institution with the
Preface so the people could hear them.
Later in the German Mass of 1526 he did something different. He replaced the
Preface with an exhortation which included an invitation to pray with him as the
Lord has taught us. He then prayed the Lords Prayer and the words of institution.
The words of institution are the answer to what was asked for in the Lords Prayer.
After this break we will briefly discuss how each petition of the Lords Prayer finds its
answer in the Lords Supper.
How the Words of Institution and the Lords Supper Answer the Requests
of the Lords Prayer

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Lets look at the petitions of the Lords Prayer and see how they are answered in the
words of institution and the Lords Supper. Again we will rely on Dr. Eckards work.
He did a beautiful job on this.
Our Father who art in heaven. The introduction addresses the Giver and
Source of all good. And the highest good he gives us is Christ. The One who
became flesh like us now enables us to call his Father our Father. The fact
that Jesus alone has the right to call God his Father is a critical ingredient in
the right perception of this prayer. He instructs those who have been
baptized into his name to call him Our Father. Because of Jesus and in his
stead we have access to God the Father. To call him Our Father is only
something we can do in and with Jesus Christ.
Hallowed be thy name. We ask that God would hallow (make holy) his name
among us and that is done in the most direct way when the words of Christ
declare that his body and blood, given and shed for us to eat and drink, are
given for the forgiveness of our sin. When we receive Christ in the Sacrament,
we come before the holy God in the name and stead of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Thy kingdom come. Here we pray for the Holy Spirit that we might believe
his Word. And his Word says that his kingdom comes to us right now through
the body and blood of Christ.
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. What is Gods will? It is that
you have eternal life in his Son. Gods will was done when Jesus died and rose
again. It is finished! We ask that Christs completed work come to fruition
here on earth. We often refer to Christs institution of the Lords Supper as his
last will and testament. It is his will that we receive his body and blood so
that we might have forgiveness and that his life might dwell within us. This is
what he wants.
Give us this day our daily bread. When we pray this petition, we naturally
think of Jesus as the Bread of Life. The Greek word rendered as daily might
also be rendered as super substantial. This then points us to the Lords
Supper. As Israel received manna in the wilderness to sustain them, so we
receive Manna of the Holy Eucharist to sustain us in our wandering through
this world until we arrive in the eternal Promised Land.
And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
What did Jesus say when he gave his disciples the chalice? This is my blood
given for you for the forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness is at the very heart of
the Sacrament of the Altar. We ask in this prayer for the forgiveness given in
the Lords Supper.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. We ask for Gods
protection as we journey through this world to bring us to himself. The
Sacrament is the food for the journey. It will secure our life in Christ as we
receive it in faith. It will be our sustenance to bring us home.

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So the Lords Prayer bumped up against the word of institution powerfully asks for
precisely what Christ is preparing to give us by means of his words.
The Lords Prayer is the Family Prayer
This prayer is the family prayer. It can only be rightly prayer by the baptized, by the
children of God, as they come to the Fathers table. Now traditionally in the west it
was the priest who said all the prayers. This included the Lords Prayer. Only in the
1950s and 60s did the people join in the Our Father in the Divine Service.
Gregorys Letter
Pastor Weedon discussed a letter from Gregory about praying the Lords Prayer
before the words of institution instead of some manmade prayer and how in the
discussions between the Lutherans and Catholics the Lutherans referenced this
letter of Gregory doing the same thing that they had done. So in a sense they were
saying to the Roman Catholics of that time that they were being more faithful to
their tradition that the Catholics were.
Listener Questions
Upon returning from a commercial break we have a couple of listener questions. In
the Lords Prayer Jesus taught us to address our prayers to the Father and in John
14:6 Jesus said, No one comes to the Father except through me. Is it important that
we address our prayers to the Father? Traditionally the Church in liturgical prayer
always addressed its prayer to the Father through the Son in the Spirit. So the
Father is the object of the prayer. In the scriptures the Son and the Spirit pray. It
would be nonsense to say the Father prays. The Father is the One to whom the
prayers of the Son, the Spirit, and the Church are directed. Thats not to say that it
is wrong to pray to Jesus or to the Holy Spirit. The Church in her liturgy does both,
but the normal mode of her prayer is to speak to the Father through the Son in the
Spirit. Jesus has made it clear that he has made his Father our Father and that we
can speak to him.
Another listener comments, I like the timelessness of the Lords Prayer. These words
were spoken by Christ himself, spoken by the apostles following him, and spoken by
every local gathering of the Christian Church since then. With these eternal words
we are joined as one body with every fellow Christian, past, present, and future, and
with Christ our Head. These words have delivered to the Church and have been
used by the Church for all this time.
Another listener says, the modern law-based teaching of Evangelicalism often arises
from the Lords Prayer. Their teaching is that Gods forgiveness of us is contingent
upon our forgiveness of one another. As a convert to Lutheranism from
Evangelicalism, I still tremble when I pray that petition, forgive us our trespasses

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as we forgive those who trespass against us. What resource is available to help me
with this? Go to the Large Catechism where Luther deals with this. Luther handles
this beautifully. He flips it on its head so that our forgiveness of others is a sign of
Gods forgiveness of us. And its freely available online.
The Words of Institution are the Gospel
Now lets talk about the words of institution. In the first part of the liturgy we
reached the first summit when we reached the Gospel reading. The Gospel reading
unpacks the life of Christ and that reading changes every Sunday. At this point in
the service there is another Gospel reading that never changes, that is the same
every Sunday. It is the hub of the wheel to which the spokes of the wheel connect.
This Gospel reading that never changes is the words of institution. Luther said,
These words are the Gospel.
Jesus is Speaking Powerful Words
When these words are said by the pastor, the pastor is just being the mouth of God.
Jesus is speaking through the pastor. Jesus speaks these words. And when he
speaks, he will cause to happen exactly what his words promise.
Luther said this so beautifully in so many ways. (Pr. Weedon shared some of them
and they are summarized in the following sentences.)
(1) It is the Word which is important. It is the Word which makes it a sacrament. It is
the Word which makes bread and wine, body and blood.
(2) Jesus conception and birth to a virgin is a great miracle. It happened when the
angel said to Mary, Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son. The
Word of God caused this great miracle. The Word has power. So it is in the
Sacrament also. As soon as Christ says, This is my body, his body is present
through the Word and the power of the Holy Spirit. If the Word is not there, its just
bread. But when the words are added, they bring with them that of which they
speak. In the beginning the Word said let there be and there was. The speaking of
Jesus literally creates the reality that he says. So when Jesus says This is my body
over that bread, then that bread is his body. And we confess that this is true. We
dont understand it. We dont know how. We dont see it, but we know what he says
is absolute truth upon which we can rely. And the same is true that Jesus words
spoken over the wine make it his true blood given for us for the forgiveness of our
sins.
The Gospel for You
Before the next break lets explain something that may puzzle people. Sometimes
the words of institution are chanted. And when they are, they are chanted slowly.
And when we get to Jesus words, This is my body and This is my blood, they are
chanted even slower. Why are these words said so slowly? Its like we are saying,

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lets watch and hear this as carefully as we can. These words, which are the very
heart of the Gospel, must be heard as true for us. The Church does not want
anything to get in the way of us hearing, receiving, and rejoicing in this Good News.
The Presence of Christ
Listener question about when the Presence of Christ comes into the elements. This
question has come up across the centuries. It also came up in Luthers time. Luther
said the Lord is bodily present in the elements beginning with the Lords Prayer or
words of institution, through the distribution, until the pastor leaves the altar. For
some Lutherans the Our Father begins the act of consecration. There is some
fuzziness to this, but we do know for certain that when Jesus speaks and says, This
is my body and this is my blood, we believe him. We trust his words and his
promises. We then have certain actions that confess the real presence of Christ. We
elevate the bread and wine; we genuflect; we make the sign of the cross; we knell
as we come into Jesus presence to receive the Sacrament.
We have a lot of questions from our listeners so we will extend this hour to get
through the questions. If the words of institution are properly spoken over the
elements, but a particular churchs doctrine is that that the elements remain
unchanged and are mere symbols, then is this still really communion? Do they
receive the body and blood anyway? The answer to this given in the Formula of
Concord is pretty clear. It says that the true body and blood of Christ is eaten and
drunk even if the priest who distributes them or the people who receive them do not
believe. Human belief or unbelief has no effect. It depends upon the Word and
ordinance of God. If they change Gods Word and ordinance and misinterpret them
then they receive only bread and wine. So that is to say that the words are not
magical. They are effective and they contain a promise, but for a community that
does not hear those words as the promise of God giving exactly what they say, then
saying the words does not magically bring about the real presence of Christ.
As an example, Pr. Wilken went to Joel Osteens church and Osteens mother did the
Lords Supper. She said the words of institution word for word but she was careful
both before and after to completely undermine them. She clearly said that what
Jesus means is that the bread and wine represent his body and blood. And many
times in churches that dont believe in the real presence they alter the words. They
will say something like, Jesus said this is a symbol of my body. Dr. Nagel said it this
way, Dont say that they dont have the real presence of Christs body and blood,
they say it themselves.
Listener Questions About the Words of Institution
We will get to as many listener questions as possible as we extend our time for
another 10 minutes. Is it appropriate to read the words of institution straight from

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one of the four biblical accounts rather than from the Lutheran Service Book (LSB)
version which seems to reference all four? The way we have it in the LSB is a
conflation of the biblical texts. Its never inappropriate to get the words directly from
the Scriptures, but the words as they come down to us in the liturgy are actually
older than the Scriptures. Christians were celebrating the Lords Supper as the
Scriptures were being written. So they had their own oral tradition side by side with
the Scriptures. Since none of the Evangelists give the whole, the Church has
gathered the words from all of the Evangelists.
A listener joined an LCMS church and worshipped in a contemporary service. Later
he switched to another LCMS church and began worshipping with the traditional
liturgy. When worshipping at the contemporary service the pastor would take liberty
with the words he used for the words of institution. How far can a church stray from
the original words of institution before a member should become nervous? That
which engenders doubt should not be embraced. When we begin to change the
Lords words, we begin to move into uncertain territory. To paraphrase the words of
the Sacrament is to gut the promise of the Sacrament. It may indicate that the
pastor considers himself as the master of the words rather than a servant of the
Word.
Why are the words of institution and the Lords Prayer chanted by the pastor in the
third setting in the Lutheran Service Book, while the other settings they are spoken?
Chanting the words of institution is a peculiarly Lutheran practice. Over time
Lutherans have both chanted and spoken the words. And the Lutheran Service Book
reflects that. Other times the people say the Lords Prayer and the pastor chants the
words of institution. There are all kinds of practices. It does not matter whether they
are spoken or chanted.
If the words of institution are said in a very rapid fashion, as Pr. Wilken despises,
does it make them less effective or ineffective? No. When the words of institution
are used as Christ gave them to be used they do exactly what they say. Those
words are effective and powerful. They are the words of Christ that convey exactly
what they promise. But Pr. Weedon encouraged pastors to remember that they are
speaking in the stead of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is using the pastors mouth to
deliver to his people the most precious gift that he literally died to give them.
If the words of institution are spoken over the elements and during communion they
run short of wine or of bread and more bread or wine is brought from the sacristy
and these elements are not consecrated, do those people who receive those
elements really receive the body and blood of Christ or just bread and wine? Our rite
is very clear. If the elements run out, you consecrate at the altar whatever part that
ran out before they are distributed. This should remove all doubt. The Word joined
to the element is the power of the Sacrament. Always consecrate the elements
before they are distributed. The Word is the certain thing so that the people know

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that the promise holds for them. The words of consecration say that this is Gods
gift for you.
In some larger churches where it takes a long time to distribute communion, they
may distribute the Sacrament by people lining up and not necessarily kneeling.
Someone might ask if there is anything wrong with this? No. There are a variety of
ways that the Supper can be distributed. What matters is that every person receives
the gift that the Lord wants to give them.
Also questions have been raised concerning using the chalice versus the little cups.
What is your pastoral thought concerning them? Pr. Weedon would encourage the
congregation to consider exactly what Jesus says he is giving in the Sacrament and
to use vessels that are appropriate and fitting for the gift that he says he is giving. If
you think it is appropriate to take the blood that redeemed the world and throw it
away in a plastic container then you have a different conception of the blood that
redeemed the world than you should have. Let what we do be a confession of what
we believe. How we treat the elements should reflect what we believe those
elements to be.
Session 20 The Pax Domini and Agnus Dei

Introduction
Today we will be contemplating what it means when the pastor elevates the body
and blood of Jesus and declares that the peace of the Lord is with you always.
What does this mean? What does it mean when the congregation responds to this
by singing this is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world? Today is
part 20 on our series on the liturgy with Pr. Will Weedon.
Biblical Roots and Placement of The Peace in the Divine Service
The word peace at this point in the liturgy is pretty big. And its pretty big in terms
of understanding what God is doing in the Divine Service as a whole. Peace is used
throughout the service. At this point of service we are on a mountain peak and the
pastor shouts out the peace of the Lord. Lets explore the biblical root of peace. The
placement of The Peace at this point is unique to the western rites. So we need to
look back at the NT and take a look at this.
At the end of almost all of Pauls epistles we have a strange instruction. He says in
Rom. 16:16, Greet one another with a holy kiss. And 1 Cor. 16:20, 2 Cor. 13:12,
and 1 Thess. 5:26, like Rom. 16:16, are almost identical. And this is not just peculiar
to Paul. When you look at the end of 1 Peter it has, Greet one another with the kiss
of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ. So they greeted each other with a kiss

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and the words The peace of the Lord be with you. And we know from early Church
documents that the men and women were segregated and that the kiss was man to
man and woman to woman in those assembled for worship. And accompanying the
kiss were the words, The peace of the Lord be with you.
This peace comes at the end of each letter, which provides us with a big hint of its
use. Remember that these epistles would have been read to the church as they
were assembled to receive the Eucharist. In the Eastern Church the peace is shared
at the end of the Service of the Word and the beginning of the Sacrament. Curiously
in our Service Book it keeps the Peace in the Roman spot before the Agnus Dei, but
it instructs that the people may greet each other with The Peace in the other spot
before the Eucharist begins. Another place where the peace is shared is right after
the absolution. The intention of the sharing of peace is that there is peace from God
in Jesus Christ that unites us with one another.
Peace - Jesus First Word to His Disciples and to Us
Now back to sharing The Peace during communion. The pastor starts out with his
back to the congregation, that is, he is facing the same direction of the people as he
addresses God. But then he turns and faces the people. Dr. Eckard compares this to
our Lords suffering, burial, and resurrection. The suffering and burial is a private
thing between the Father and the Son. But then after the miracle of the resurrection
the Son turns to his disciples and speaks the word of peace to them. So in the same
way, after the miracle of the real bodily presence of Christ, the Lord, working
through the pastor, turns to the congregation and says, The peace of the Lord be
with you all. The word peace is big because it was the first word that the Lord
spoke to his disciples after the miracle of his resurrection (John 20) and it is the first
word the Lord says to us after the miracle of his presence caused by the words of
institution.
Jesus is Our Peace
This word peace is a word that Jesus had wanted to speak to humanity for a long
time. His first word to the women after his resurrection was rejoice. And his first
word to the disciples was peace. Joy and peace are the full fruit of what he has
accomplished in bringing and giving humanity back to the Father by his sacrifice
upon the cross and resurrection. He gives us the gift of peace. This was the peace
that the angels anticipated when they sang at Jesus birth peace on earth. Peace
is a person. Jesus is the peace between God and man. And Jesus is the peace
between man and man.
That is the point of having The Peace at this point in the liturgy. The One who is our
reconciliation with the Father is also our reconciliation with one another. The shape
of the cross reminds us that Jesus not only unites heaven and earth (vertical, God

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and man), but he also unites horizontally men with each other. He pulls them all
together. Jesus is the meeting place of peace. Paul says this in Ephesians when he
says, He himself is our peace (Eph. 2:14).
Sharing Christs Peace is Much More Than a Holy Howdy
Unfortunately, many times the sharing of the peace (which comes after peace is
announced by the pastor to the congregation) has become a glorified good
morning, the so called, holy howdy. Its treated as a time to say hi, glad you are
here. That is not the intention at all! There is a story from the early church of a
priest who observed one Sunday that one brother would not share the peace with
another brother. He stopped everything and went down to see what was going on.
And if they couldnt make peace with each other, they left. There is a lot more to
this than shaking hands. We will continue with this after a commercial break.
So in this case, two brothers in Christ are so mad at each other that they wont
share Christs peace with each other. The pastor comes to them to see if he can
reconcile them. If he cannot bring about reconciliation, the pastor has them
escorted out. You cannot bring your division into the Sacrament of the Altar. The
unity with God and with one another is a sacred and holy gift from God. And you just
cant toy with it. In the liturgy just before this weve prayed, forgive us our
trespasses, as we have forgiven those who have trespassed against us. If you cant
forgive someone for a wrong theyve done to you, you cant hold on to that sin and
bring it to the table of the Lord. The idea is that peace is a gift that comes from
Jesus and it flows from him to us and through us to others.
Pr. Wilken shared the experience he had growing up. It was a time of liturgical
transition when The Peace was being reintroduced into the Divine Service. And the
pastor being very well-meaning would go up and down the center aisle during the
sharing of the peace and greet everyone. He wanted everyone to know that he saw
them and that they were all welcome. The problem with this is that the focus has
shifted. The focus under these circumstances becomes, Im glad youre here,
instead of Your sins have been removed. And in the presence of God you have
been united to Jesus Christ and to one another. We have peace with God through
Jesus Christ. There is a big difference between the two.
The Peace is an Absolution
In Luthers description of the sharing of peace, he called it an absolution, a wiping
out of sin. When Christ comes to you and says to you, Peace, he is saying to you
there is no longer a barrier between you and him. And there is no barrier between
you and the Father. And there is no barrier between you and another person. In him
you have been given the gift of unity with God and with man. Sharing the peace is a
lot bigger than Im glad you are here. There is nothing wrong with Im glad you

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are here, but the peace he gives is much more than feeling warm and cozy and
welcome. It is the actual conveyance to you of the forgiveness of your sins. Thats
why when the pastor says, The peace of the Lord be with you always, the answer
by the congregation should be Amen! - gift received!
Most of the time in our congregations the pastor says these words, The peace of
the Lord be with you all while the pastor is holding in one hand the chalice (wine)
and in the other hand the host (bread). And he is holding them toward the people
and elevated so that all can see them. What is intended by this word and action
together? After his resurrection, the risen Christ showed his disciples his wounds
and said to them, Peace be with you. In holding up the crucified and risen body
and blood of Christ and saying, The peace of the Lord be with you always, the
pastor is saying to the congregation, This is your peace. Christ is your peace. He
has wiped out all your sin. His body and blood was the atoning sacrifice for your sin
and the sin of the whole world. Its all forgiven. Its all gone. Rejoice! So in this
Sacrament God offers to you the seal, proof, and guarantee that your sins are gone!
That is peace.
Why Sing the Agnus Dei After Receiving Christs Peace?
Having been given this wonderful peace, why do we sing this ancient song, the
Agnus Dei (the Lamb of God) next? This song comes from the words of John the
Baptist in John chapter 1, Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the
world! The Church takes Johns words and makes them into their own prayer. There
is something important to take note of here. Almost all of the prayers of the Church
are addressed to God the Father. But now we come to this moment where Christ is
present in his holy body and in his holy blood. And the Church addresses him
directly in intimate love. And when she does, she calls him who he is the Lamb of
God who takes away the sins of the world. The Church has just been given the gift
of peace. How could she not immediately think about how he accomplished that
peace?
Also notice this. In the Agnus Dei we address Christ three times by singing Christ,
the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. And each time we make a
petition. In the first two petitions we ask Jesus to have mercy on us. In the last
petition we ask him to grant us peace. And Jesus does give us peace [in the
distribution] when he puts his body and blood into our mouths and promises that
this is for the forgiveness of our sins.
Sometimes the Agnus Dei Covers an Action
Pr. Wilken remembered attending a church in Minnesota. And when they got to the
Agnus Dei everything stopped. The pastor did not finish preparing for communion.
He did not commune himself. He elevated the body and blood of Christ for all to

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see, as he had done for the sharing of The Peace, and the people sang. At that
moment all of the focus was on Christ.
Originally the Agnus Dei covered an action of the pastor. The pastor would take a
loaf of bread, break it, and tare it into pieces for distribution. This took place during
the Agnus Dei. Back then there were not a set number of repetitions. The choir and
congregation kept singing until all the bread was torn up. Later when the Church
started using individual wafers, the song was standardized with the three petitions.
A Question About Our Communion Practices
The switching from a common loaf to pre-broken bread raises a question. It was
probably not intended, but this change brought about a liturgical change. What do
we say about this? [The same holds true for using individual cups as well.] Paul talks
about the cup of blessing and the bread which we break. He talks about them being
a communion in the body and blood of Christ. He talks about us being one just as
there is one loaf. If Paul walked into our churches would he recognize what we are
doing as communion? He would probably ask, What are you trying to say by having
individual bread and individual cups? What is it that you are confessing? For Paul,
the one cup and one loaf confessed that we are all one. We share the same bread
and we share the same cup.
Lets be clear about this. We are not in any way suggesting that having individual
cups and individual breads invalidates the promise of Christ in the Sacrament. All
we are asking here is, What does it confess? It confesses that we live in a very
individualistic society.
History of the Peace and Agnus Dei
The first history that Pr. Weedon could find for the place in the liturgy where The
Peace is currently in is from Pope Innocent I. This is at the beginning of the 400s.
Innocent argued that in its placement at this spot, the people were assenting to the
prayer and words that preceded it.
The history of the Agnus Dei goes back to late 600s. Islam was on the rise and
priests were fleeing from the east to the west and bringing their practices with
them. It appears that the Agnus Dei was a gem brought over at that time. And so it
became an established practice at that time.
In the east, there is a strong Passover flavor to the Eastern Churchs communion
practice. As they are preparing the Eucharist, they refer to the bread they are
preparing as the lamb. And when we hear lamb, that brings together a whole
constellation of images. When John the Baptist called Jesus the Lamb of God it takes
your mind back to Is. 53 where it talks about a lamb before its shearers. It takes
your mind back to the Passover and the blood of the lamb that protected the

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Israelites from the angel of death. It takes your mind back even further to Abraham
and Isaac and how God himself provided the lamb for the sacrifice. And it takes us
further back to the dawn of worship, to Abels acceptable sacrifice of a lamb. And of
course there was the sacrifice of lambs at the temple every morning and evening
without stopping. It was a constant theme throughout the scriptures and all of these
lambs pointed ahead and found their fulfillment in the One who willingly by his own
volition gave himself as the Lamb of God to bear the sin of the world. He chose this
suffering and death in order to set us free.
Pr. Weedon then read a piece Catholic liturgiologist about the Angus Dei from his
history of the Divine Service.
Is this why the front of the altar many times has depicted on it a slain lamb that is
nevertheless victorious? We will address this later after a commercial break. And
this connects to the Lamb that we find in the book of Revelation where we see not
just the end of time but also the Eucharist taking place.
Question About a Pastor Communing Himself
Before getting to the lamb imagery, Pr. Wilken asked a couple of questions. The first
question has to do with the pastor communing himself during the Agnus Dei. Pr.
Wilken had never seen this growing up. And the first time he saw it, he was a bit
shocked. And when people first see it they tend to be shocked too. What is the
historic practice? A pastor communing himself is what is instructed in our Altar
Book. The Altar Book mirrors Luthers instruction that the pastor first commune
himself and then his people. This is not universally followed by Lutherans.
Sometimes the pastor is communed by another clergyman. Only in the twentieth
century do we find someone who is not an ordained pastor distributing the body and
blood of Christ to anyone, let alone to a pastor. This used to be expressly forbidden.
What is the thinking there? The thinking was that there are people who Christ has
appointed to distribute his gifts. And those whom Christ has appointed distribute
Christs gifts to the congregation and to themselves. Dr. Nagel used to say that the
office of the ministry reaches its maximal confession when the pastor appointed to
this office by Christ communes himself who is a sinner.
Another question about this. Sometimes the pastor self-communes beforehand, but
sometimes a pastor will commune himself last. The latter is a very typical
Scandinavian practice. Some think of it in a similar way as having guests to your
house. You make sure they are taken care of before yourself. But there is a problem
with this way of thinking. In Holy Communion the pastor is not the host. Jesus is.
Lamb Imagery

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Now lets talk about the book of Revelation because that is where the appearance of
the Lamb explodes. To set the context, in Revelation there is a scroll that needs to
be opened. All of creation waits to have it opened and its verdict read. But no one is
found who is worthy to open it, until there appears in the heavenly throne room a
Lamb who had been slain but which was now alive. The slain but victorious Lamb is
worthy and able to loosen the seal and open the scroll to reveal the inner history of
mankind and the secret to life itself. He is able to do it because he has overcome
death and by his blood he has purchased people for God from every language and
country. And all of creation joins in praising the Lamb. So what this says is, if you
havent figured out what life is for, this praise of the Lamb thats what life is for.
That is what creation is for. We praise this One, who out of incredible love, chose to
redeem us by becoming one of us and taking our sin to the cross like a lamb to the
slaughter. He did this willingly so that we could partake in his joy forever.
If we understand the Eucharist in this light, his presence not only brings forgiveness
to believers, but also judgment to the world. If the world understood this, they
would be stopping us on Sunday mornings because we are bringing judgment into
the world. The future of this world is not any earthly kingdoms. The future of the
world is the kingdom of the Lamb. This kingdom will triumph. And we gather each
Sunday to live from its future triumph. Thats a neat thing about the liturgy. Its not
just a remembrance of the past. Its not just about Christ coming to us in the
present. Its also about the future being reached back to us in the now to sustain us
as we journey toward it. To the world this makes absolutely no sense, but in this
Sacrament the Christian Church lives and has communion with the living God.
With only a few seconds left, in the Agnus Dei we pray that the Lamb has taken the
sins of the world away. So this is not just about us. This takes in the entire world.
When Jesus went to the cross, he took away the sins of the whole world. So when
we talk to people about Jesus, we dont say, Todd, if you believe then Jesus will
forgive your sins. Instead we say, Todd, Jesus has forgiven you all your sins!
Believe it! Its yours! Thats a huge difference. The difference is in one case making
the Gospel conditioned and in the other case making it an unconditional promise.
Session 21 The Distribution and Distribution Hymns

Introduction
On Sunday morning in the Divine Service the pastor distributes to his congregation
the body and blood of Christ. And as he does many congregations sing hymns.
Some people wonder if we should be singing, that it might be distracting us from
what is important. But in reality this is a celebration. This is a feast. In this feast
Christ is the host and he is really present with us. If Jesus were really with you at

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your house, would you be singing hymns? Yes! It is very appropriate. These hymns
are thoroughly Christ centered. Some of them contain some of the most profound
theology that the Church ever sings.
Singing During the Distribution
Lets start out today talking about singing during the distribution. We dont normally
sing while other people are eating. Why do we do this? As was just said, this is a
feast. And we cant all receive the Meal at one time. So while some receive others
sing. And sometimes as some receive they are singing too (ever notice people come
forward singing?). When we sing, we sing the adoration of the One we are receiving,
of the One who is truly present in his body and blood.
This singing is a very public confession of the doctrine of real presence. We are
singing out loud that you Jesus are truly present giving us your body and your
blood. And so it is to you we sing our praises, our thanks, our adoration.
Our Actions in the Distribution Confess the Real Presence
Lets talk about the distribution and then we will come back and talk about some of
those hymns that we sing and some of the deep theology behind them. We often
talk about on this program about the fact that when we do something it makes a
confession. So lets talk about the manner that we receive the Lords Supper and
what it confesses. What actions are used by the Church to make a right confession?
In many LCMS churches the custom is to kneel down when receiving the
Lords Supper. We kneel before Christ; we adore Christ, confessing that he is
really present under the bread and wine with his true body and blood.
Many Lutherans will make the sign of the cross prior to or after receiving the
Lords body and blood. This is a confession that by the cross Jesus made us
his own and that marked with the cross we belong to Christ the crucified One.
When some people receive the Sacrament they simply open their mouths to
receive it. Here we think of Ps. 81 where God says, Open your mouth and I
will fill it. [In doing this, we confess that Christ is too holy for us lowly sinners
to even touch.]
Others receive Christs body with their hand. In doing so we make our hands
a throne for God.
The Administration of the Supper
Perhaps we should mention the order of distribution. Our Altar Book is very explicit
on several points.
The presiding minister of the Supper should receive the gifts first. He should
commune himself and then he should commune those who are assisting him
and then he communes the people.

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And when the gifts are being given out, the minister should administer the
Lords body because this is the decisive act of admission to the Lords table.
He is the steward of the mysteries in that church therefore he goes first and
he admits to the table. This may require some more explanation because this
is dealing with closed communion. The pastor bears responsibility to admit or
not to admit people to the Lords Supper. For instance, if the pastor knows of
someone who is living in manifest and impenitent sin, he is required not to
admit that person. If the elder who is assisting with Communion administers
the bread and does not know this, he will unknowingly admit him. The pastor
is the one who has to answer to Christ for the administration of the
Sacrament. So the pastor should lead the way and those assisting him should
take their cue from him.
The words used during the distribution are the key words Christ used in his
institution of the Lords Supper. They can be said in two ways. The pastor can
say a short form, The true body of Christ given for you. The true blood of
Christ shed for you. Or he can use the fuller form, Take and eat. This is the
true body of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ given into death for your sins.
Take and drink. This is the true blood of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
shed for the remission of all your sins. Either way it is a paraphrase of the
words of Christ. Someone who is of the reformed side of the faith cannot and
will not say these words when the bread and wine are given out. These words
are important, whether the short form or long form is used, because they say
exactly what this Meal is. They are very clear: In, with, and under the bread is
Jesus body and in, with, and under the wine is Jesus blood.
Distribution Hymn O Lord We Praise Thee
Coming back from a commercial break we heard the three stanzas of the hymn, O Lord We
Praise Thee authored by Martin Luther.
1. O Lord, we praise Thee, bless Thee, and adore Thee,
In thanksgiving bow before Thee.
Thou with Thy body and Thy blood didst nourish
Our weak souls that they may flouish:
O Lord, have mercy!
May Thy body, Lord, born of Mary,
That our sins and sorrows did carry,
And Thy blood for us plead
In all trial, fear, and need:
O Lord, have mercy!

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2. Thy holy body into death was given,
Life to win for us in heaven.
No greater love than this to Thee could bind us;
May this feast thereof remind us!
O Lord, have mercy!
Lord, Thy kindness did so constrain Thee
That Thy blood should bless and sustain me.
All our debt Thou hast paid;
Peace with God once more is made:
O Lord, have mercy.
3. May God bestow on us His grace and favor
To please Him with our behavior
And live as brethren here in love and union
Nor repent this blest Communion!
O Lord, have mercy!
Let not Thy good Spirit forsake us;
Grant that heavenly-minded He make us;
Give Thy Church, Lord, to see
Days of peace and unity:
O Lord, have mercy!
By Martin Luther
What makes this hymn appropriate to sing during the distribution of the Lords
Supper? This One whom we are praising, blessing, and adoring we confess to be the
One (Jesus) who nourishes our poor weak souls with his body and blood (stanza 1).
Luther was not content to confess the real presence of Christs body born of Mary
(stanza 1). He wanted more. So in the second stanza the doctrine of atonement is
clearly presented. It tells how Christs body and blood have been offered to God the
Father by Christ as a payment for debt. It is a debt that we owed and could not even
begin to pay. He paid it for us. So this expresses the truth that this body and blood
were given by Christ for you for the forgiveness of your sins. This body and blood is
the same body and blood that was on the cross dying for you. How do you know
your sins are forgiven? Because this body that you are each receiving was on
Calvarys tree for you and me. And this blood, which is going down our throats, is
the same blood that blotted out the sins of the whole world, which includes all of our
sins too.
Also important is the fact that this Sacrament produces fruit in our lives. Notice how
this plays out in stanza three. When Jesus gives us the forgiveness of sins, he also

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gives us the Holy Spirit. They always go together. We ask that God help us in life to
focus on the good gifts he gives us in Christ. But this Meal, which should be a Meal
of unity for the Church, has become one of division. So we pray that the Holy Spirit
overcome this division and bring to fruition the Lords Supper in our lives. And we
know that on the Last Day there will be peace and unity in Christ and all Christians
will participate in the eternal Feast.
This hymn became very popular in Lutheran churches. In some churches it became
almost part of the liturgy. It became the second most sung hymn from Luther. (The
other being the creedal hymn, We All Believe in One True God.) Its content is very
objective.
Distribution Hymn - Soul Adorn Yourself with Gladness
Coming back from the commercial break we heard a couple of stanzas from the
hymn Soul, Adorn Yourself with Gladness. What are some of the things in this
hymn that make it so right as a distribution hymn? This hymn came out at the
beginning of Lutheran pietism and it has all the warmth of that period. This hymn
was written by Johann Franck, who was a lawyer and politician. He was a great poet
and this hymn is powerfully tender.
This hymn begins by addressing the soul. Where does this come from? The Psalms:
Bless the Lord, O my soul ... Like the Psalter it talks to our inner selves. It
encourages us to leave gloominess behind. Instead put on gladness and joy and
praise the One who shows unbounded grace in this great banquet. Amazingly, this
high and holy One comes to dwell with you in this feast (stanza 1). This overflowing
joy of dwelling with the Holy One has come to characterize Lutheran mediation on
the Sacrament.
By this time in history the number of hymns written for the Lords Supper was
exploding. It is an important theme in Lutheran hymn writing that continues to this
day. Why is that? The liturgy is sacramental (God doing and acting for us). There is
great joy in Christ being present to wipe out our sins. In the Sacrament Jesus gives
us forgiveness that is bigger than all our sins and life that is bigger than all our
death. And the Lutheran Church in meditating on this great mystery has developed
a pile of hymnody that is characterized by both its warmth and overflowing joy.
We delight in this One who comes to us. In fact look at the imagery of stanza 2. A
bride runs out to the Bridegroom in loving reverence to greet him. He has the words
of life and he is knocking at your portal (Rev. 3). (Many try and make this about
conversion, but that is taking it completely out of context. He is talking to the
Church.) The people of God constantly open their lives to receive more and more of
him. This hymn then tells us how to pray to him as he comes to us to give us his
good gifts.

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It is impossible to sing these hymns without adoring our Savior who is present
among us in this body and blood. Wouldnt you agree? Yes, first there is the tune. It
invites tender harmonies to pour out. And then there are the gestures in the piece.
In stanza 5 it no longer speaks to the soul but to Jesus. It names him as Truest
Friend, Dearest Treasure, Peace, expanding Joy, Love Incarnate. Because he is all of
these things we bow before him. We adore him. The hymn helps us to ask that we
worthily receive him and never leave him. As you read through this, cant you feel
the tender warmth of it?
Stanza 7 names Jesus as: Son of Life, my Splendor, Friend most tender, Joy of my
desiring, Fount of Life, my Maker, and Blessed Food from heaven. This is the One we
are receiving in the Sacrament. We cant help but fall down before him and praise
him.
When we sing these hymns, its impossible to get the impression that somehow my
soul is ascending to be with a distant heavenly Jesus. Its all Jesus right here with us.
There is an old saying that the incarnation destroys Pelagianism. That is, there is no
distance for you to go to get to him when he comes all the way down to you. The
Sacrament is simply the continuation of the incarnation. The Incarnate One is
among us and with us according to this Word and promise.
When we return from a break we will look at one more hymn and the Amen and
dismissal.
Distribution Hymn Wide Open Stands the Gates
We heard the three verses of the hymn Wide Open Stands the Gates as we came
back from a commercial. If you sing hymns like this, you cant not believe that Jesus
is really present in this Sacrament. If you dont believe it, you wouldnt honestly be
able to sing it because they confess it so clearly. This hymn came from the 19 th
century and that was a time of thinking about the nature of the Church. It was made
clear at that time that the heavenly church and the earthly church were one Church.
And that is made clear in this hymn.
Notice how the heavenly Church is described the gates are wide open. When we
gather at the Eucharist, we are gathered at heavens open gates. And then look at
what happens. The angel choirs surround the golden throne praising the Son. They
watch as he descends to us, his Church on earth. He comes down to bring us life
and new birth.
How does he give life and new birth? (Stanza 2) He speaks the word. In the
Sacrament it is not the pastor speaking. It is the Lord Jesus Christ who is speaking.
And his word causes to be what it says. So when he says, This is my body, This is
my blood, the bread is his body and the wine is his blood. And he bids us to eat and
drink with thankfulness this gift of heavenly food. As humans we cant understand

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how this can be so how he can stoop low to heal us, how he is present as both
Host and Meal.
(Stanza 3) The angels are watching all this happen and the saints in heaven are
kneeling around the altar. This Sacrament is binding. It binds heaven and earth, the
saints and angels with the Church on earth. Time no longer matters as it is
subsumed into eternity. Space no longer matters as all of Gods people are joined
into one.
How the Distribution Ends
When the pastor announces the body given for you and the blood given for you, the
people respond with, Amen! This is huge for us to speak amen. This is an affirmation
that says, What you just said pastor is absolutely true! This is what Jesus is giving to
me. He is giving me his true body and blood for the forgiveness of my sin.
And after receiving the body and blood of Christ the pastor dismisses the
communicants. The words the pastor speaks are not a wish. It is a benediction. It is
a statement of what is. The words of the dismissal are: The body and blood of our
Lord Jesus Christ strengthen and preserve you in body and soul to life everlasting.
Depart in peace. This is basically a command. It is saying, This will happen. The gift
has been delivered. The gift has been received. This body and blood that you have
received will keep you to life everlasting. And that is why you can depart in peace.
Session 22 The Nunc Dimittis, Post-Communion Canticles

and Collects
A Lose String
Last time we were talking about the distribution of the Lords Supper and we were
up to the dismissal when we ran out of time. (They finished this off and I included
this in the last paragraph of session 21).
Simeons Prayer
The dismissal ended with Depart in peace and so peace is what hooks it to the
canticle that follows it. The canticle is a prayer, Lord, now let your servant depart in
peace. Lets first discuss to the original context of this prayer, the prayer of
Simeon, and why it is so appropriate to use here right after Communion.
The story of Simeon comes from Luke chapter 2. It is the tradition of the Church that
Simeon was old. That is kind of implied in the text but not said directly. Simeon was
waiting for the Christ, the promised Savior. The Holy Spirit revealed to him that he

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would not die until he saw the Lords Christ. He went to the temple on the day that
baby Jesus was brought there. How did the Holy Spirit prompt him to go that day?
We dont know the answer, but we can put forth a good educated guess. If you were
in Jerusalem when Jesus was born and you heard that the shepherds were telling of
their amazing experience about the Savior being born, then you would know that
since he was a Jew, the baby would be brought to the temple 40 days later for the
purification ceremony as was required by the Law of Moses.
In any event Simeon is there at the temple waiting and here walks in Mary and
Joseph, carrying baby Jesus and the two turtle doves for an offering. Simeon went to
them and took the baby in his arms. As he held the baby, Simeon said: Lord, now
you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes
have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a
light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel. Including this
song as part of the Communion liturgy was a Lutheran innovation. This prayer,
called the Nunc Dimittis, had been used in other Church liturgies, especially at the
end of the day at Compline. But once Lutherans put it here in the Divine Service, it
seemed like a perfect fit.
So when the pastor dismisses them from the Lords table by saying, Depart in
peace, the people cant help but think of Simeon holding the body of the Christ
child. We cant help but think about it because now at this time and place we too
have held in our hands the same body of the Christ. So we can take Simeons prayer
and make it our very own. In it we are saying, Having just received Gods gracious
gifts in the body and blood of Jesus, I can die right now. I am perfectly at peace.
Going Through the Nunc Dimittis
Returning from a commercial break we heard the Nunc Dimittis from Divine Service
I. There is some tension created in the Lords Supper concerning the salvation God
has provided. This salvation provided and made available in the Lords Supper was
intended for all people. Therefore this salvation is all inclusive. It is meant for all and
is available for all. Yet this salvation is only in Christ. You cannot get it anywhere
else. So in that sense it is exclusive.
It is Christ who brings together the Jews and Gentiles; they become one in him. No
where does this come true any better than in the Lords Supper. Early Christians
wrestled with this in Acts and Galatians. The Lord has one table and all of his people
share it.
Just as Simeon sang this song consciously with reference to the Christ child in his
arms, so we sing it consciously with reference to the Lords Supper. Both Simeon
and we are saying, Lord, youve given us all we need. Even if we die right now,
youve given us a life that death cant take from us. Do we have a greater

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fulfillment than Simeon did? Simeon held the body that was promised to be given
into death for the sins of the world. We hold and receive the body that has fulfilled
that promise. It was given into death and raised from the dead for the sins of the
world.
Traditionally this song ends with the Trinitarian invocation, the Gloria Patri. In doing
so we glorify God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In doing so, we recognize that Gods
kingdom has come down to us now, that heaven has reached down to earth. And
when his name is sung, it is a normal practice to bow. We bow any time Gods name
is named, especially in the Gloria Patri.
At the dismissal from the Lords Table, the people are told that the Supper has
ended and you may leave in peace. But then in the Nunc Dimittis instead of leaving,
we stick around for a little while longer. Its kind of like when your adult kids come
home and its time for them to leave. You say goodbye and walk out to the car with
them. And then a half hour later youre still standing out there talking. Its hard to
leave the Lords presence. That is why this is sometimes called the long goodbye.
In the first liturgy of the LCMS by the Saxons, they did not have the Nunc Dimittis.
They received the dismissal, had a versicle and thanksgiving collect, and had the
benediction. That was it. It was a very quick ending. Weve become accustom to this
long goodbye. We dont want to go yet. We want to sing some more to our Savior
and rejoice in the glory of his presence.
Ready to Die in Peace
There is an alternate to the Nunc Dimittis called Thank the Lord and Sing His Praise.
This is a paraphrase of Ps. 105. It was composed in the mid Twentieth century. It has
a certain missionary thrust. What we just had in the Supper is for all people so lets
go out and tell everyone what he has done. But it doesnt have the gravity of Im
ready to die in peace. Its really radical that the whole congregation stands up and
tells God, Ok, we ready to go at any time; were ready to die. Were saying, This
life that has been given to us in Jesus cannot be taken away from us. Not even
death can take that life. Death is a defeated enemy. We have nothing to fear. The
body and blood given to us are a guarantee that our sins have been wiped out and
forgiven.
Most Lutheran pastors have had the opportunity to be at the death bed of a
parishioner to give the Lords Supper and to sing the Nunc Dimittis. This is a very
powerful moment. And it is used again at the funeral service as the pastor places
his hand on the casket and says, Lord, now let your servant depart in peace. Your
word has been fulfilled. This is our way of saying to death, You did not win. You did
not conquer this person. This person belonged to Christ and he will rise again and
have life that does not end. They can literally go to their grave in peace.

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Borrowing for Private Devotions
Returning from a commercial break we heard the Nunc Dimittis from Divine Service
setting four. One more thing about the Nunc Dimittis. I think one good practice for
Christians is to borrow from the Divine Service for private devotions. The primary
location of our devotion is not the prayer closet but the gathering around Christs
body and blood. The Nunc Dimittis seems perfect for this. Can you imagine any
better words with which to put your head down on your pillow to go to sleep than
Lord, now let thou thy servant depart in peace? That is why it was in Compline.
Thats why its included, with a little different wording, in childrens night time
prayer. Every night we practice dying.
Post Communion Prayer #1
After the Nunc Dimittis we have prayers. In Divine Service Setting Three the prayer
begins with, O give thanks to the Lord for he is good and his mercy endures
forever. This verse comes from the Psalms. So the thanksgiving for his good gifts
continues in this prayer. Another verse that used to be used but is not included in
our current hymnbook is: As often as we eat this bread and drink this cup we
proclaim the Lords death until he comes. This has been moved to before the
Supper in Divine Services One and Two.
After the introduction to the prayer comes the prayer. We have three prayers in our
book. All three prayers are gems. The first prayer is by far the most common postCommunion Lutheran prayer. And this prayer by Dr. Luther is Luther at his best.
We give thanks to You, almighty God, that You have refreshed us through this
salutary gift, and we implore You that, of Your mercy, You would strengthen us
through the same in faith toward You and in fervent love toward one another;
through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and
the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Luther once wrote that a Christian lives outside of himself. He lives in Christ by faith
and he lives in his neighbor by love. So not only did Luther teach and preach that,
he also prayed it. So the fulfillment of the Sacrament is outward, out toward our
neighbors.
It says You have refreshed us through this salutary gift. The word salutary is a
little archaic. In the very first translation of this by the LCMS it was translated as
wholesome. Thats really what salutary means. It means: good for your health.
This gift that we have received is good for our physical and spiritual health. Another
word that could be used in the place of salutary gift is saving gift.
Lets talk about refreshed us. It is like when Jesus says, Come unto me all of you
who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. Jesus is saying, I will

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refresh you. I will restore you. Its Ps. 23 type language. He promises rest for your
soul. The rest that he promises and gives here is above all the rest and peace that
comes to someone when they know that their sins have been atoned for. That is
refreshment in its deepest meaning. This is like water being received in the desert
by parched lips. It refreshes. It is just what you need.
The word strengthen is used in both the dismissal and here in the prayer. It seems
to be a slight departure from the way the Scriptures speak about the Lords Supper.
But this is based on the analogy of food. Food strengthens you. The food we receive
in the Supper strengthens us in two ways. First it strengthens us to trust that the
promises of God are for us. Christs body and blood were given for you for the
wiping out of all your sin. And second it strengthens us in fervant love towards one
another. Another word for fervent might be fevered. Its a fiery, burning type of
love.
Another prayer that some churches choose to use, especially during the Advent,
Christmas, and Epiphany seasons, goes as follows:
O God the Father, the fountain and source of all goodness, who in loving
kindness sent Your only begotten Son into the flesh, we thank You that for His
sake You have given us pardon and peace in this Sacrament, and we ask You
not to forsake Your children but always to rule our hearts and minds by Your
Holy Spirit that we may be enabled to serve You constantly; through Jesus
Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.
This is a Trinitarian prayer. The Father in his love sends into the flesh the Lord Jesus
Christ, his only begotten Son. And he does so in order to give us pardon and peace.
And we pray that the Holy Spirit would always rule our hearts and minds that we
mind be able to serve him with peace and joy.
The third prayer is a more contemporary prayer and it appears in Divine Services
One and Two.
Gracious God, our heavenly Father, You have given us a foretaste of the feast
to come in the Holy Supper of Your Sons body and blood. Keep us firm in the
true faith throughout our days of pilgrimage that, on the day of His coming,
we may together with all Your saints, celebrate the marriage feast of the
Lamb in His kingdom which has no end; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our
Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and
forever. Amen.

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We are on a pilgrimage; we are on our way home. And this is the food that God has
given us. He breaks off a piece from the future and reaches into the past and gives
it to us to strengthen us as we journey through the present towards the future to
our final home, where we will join in the great marriage feast of the Lamb. When we
return from this break, we will take listener questions.
Listener Questions
A listener asks, For a layperson who is not a Lutheran, how should I understand this
Song of Simeon? The Lord Jesus has been given to you by the Father in order that
you might depart in peace. I would encourage every Christian to find a church that
celebrates the Lords Supper on a regular basis and they recognize that it is Christs
true body and blood for the forgiveness of your sins. Whether you are Lutheran or
not, I would ask that you often think about this One, the Lord Jesus Christ born of
Mary, who shed his blood on the cross for you and all people, he is the One who
enables you to depart in peace.
A listener writes: We sing the Nunc Dimittis with our kids. It goes together
beautifully with Luthers evening prayer. As Lutheran converts, my husband and I
really love to discover and cherish the historic practice of singing and chanting the
songs of the Bible. Amen! There is nothing like singing the actual words of the
Scriptures themselves. She mentions that it dovetails nicely with Luthers evening
prayer. Lets talk about that a bit. In Luthers evening prayer, we thank God for
watching over us during the day and asking for his forgiveness for all the things
weve done wrong. And then we commit ourselves and all that we have into his care
that the evil foe may not have any power over us. And man is that important when
you come to the moment of your death. At the last moment Satan will throw into
your face all of the sins that youve ever done and say, Look at them. You belong to
me, not to God. But what comfort it is to say, No, I have a Savior who answered for
all of my sins! I can depart in peace because his body and blood have atoned for my
sin.
Having listened to how the Nunc Dimittis ties in with the end of day and end of life,
this brings a question to mind. Can we see the Divine Service as the life of
Christian? The Service begins with the Divine Name, which was placed on us in
Baptism. And the service ends with departing in peace as the face of God shines on
us (Benediction, which we will cover next time). This is a picture of your entire
Christian pilgrimage, your whole life in Christ. This is especially true of the elderly.
They struggle to come forward for the Supper. They cant kneel anymore because of
bad knees. Their hands are gnarled and fingers crooked. Yet, their hands are the
throne that hold the body of Christ. But just take a look at their face. Sometimes
tears are just streaming down. They love the Supper. They know full well the sins of
their life. But the Supper gives them pardon and peace.

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Here is another listener question. Why do some settings of the Divine Service have
a choice between a Thanksgiving Canticle and the Nunc Dimittis and others have
both the Nunc Dimittis and the Thanksgiving? All or our settings have a prayer of
thanksgiving after the post-Communion song. We just have a variety of postCommunion songs.
Ready to Say Good-Bye
We are now at the point in the service where we are about to say good-bye; we are
about to leave. The Supper has ended and it is time for the service to end. The only
thing left is for God to have the final word. Is this the time where we completely
stop? Where we stop the service just like we began the service? Yes, we let God
have the final say. In our services the final word from God comes from the Aaronic
benediction from Numbers. That is a unique to Lutherans. The western liturgy had
some other words and a blessing at the end. But Luther thought we could do better.
What better way than to use the very words of the Lords blessing. Well talk about
this next time.
Session 23 The Benediction

Introduction
Who gets the last word in the Divine Service? The Benediction or Blessing stands at
the very end of the service. One commonly used by Lutherans is the Aaronic
Benediction. It was a feature of OT worship and it has been brought forward to NT
worship. Today we will find out why this is appropriate.
How the Aaronic Benediction Became a Part of the Lutheran Divine Service
Lets start out by taking a general view on how Christians end their worship
services. In researching this Pr. Weedon was rather shocked at how over the years
the Divine Service has ended. Originally during the Middle Ages the Benediction was
something the bishop did. The average priest did not give a blessing. But we see
once again over time that what originally belonged to the bishop came to the
pastor. (We see this over and over again in Church history.)
By the time of Luther, the service ended in a very distinct way. After the distribution
and the prayers of thanksgiving, and if the Gloria was sung in the beginning of the
service, the priest would say, The Mass has ended. And the people responded
with, Thanks be to God. If the Gloria was not sung (Advent, Lent, or a weekday),
then the pastor would say, Bless we the Lord. And the people responded with,
Thanks be to God. Then no matter which ending was used, the priest would turn
back to the altar and offer a personal prayer. Luther did not like this prayer and

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instead suggested a different prayer. But then comes the interesting part. He said
there is this benediction in Num. 6 that the Lord himself gave us and that would be
really good to use the Aaronic Benediction. (Pr. Weedon read from Num. 6.) He
also said Ps. 67 would be good too. These options were given by Luther in 1523 AD.
In 1526 AD Luther published his German Mass. In this version the part that comes
after the distribution is very short. It had the Prayer of Thanksgiving and
immediately after that came, The Lord bless you and keep you the Aaronic
Benediction. He gave no other options. Over those 3 years the Aaronic Benediction
became the standard way of closing the service. And the Lutheran Church
overwhelmingly agreed with Dr. Luther. The pastor saying the Aaronic Benediction
became the way that Lutherans ended the Divine Service. And it still remains that
way today.
The name of God was big for Luther. And the Aaronic Benediction puts the name of
God on the people and sends them forth in peace.
A Twist on the Aaronic Benediction
Returning from the commercial we heard the benediction sung from Divine Service
One. Lets talk a bit about how among the Lutherans this benediction took on
different forms. The most common form that we are used to hearing in English,
which we received from the Saxons in Germany, was literally taken directly out of
Num. 6.
But there was an interesting variation on it in Sweden. A student of Luther returned
to Sweden and published his own Swedish service with a little twist at the end. The
pastor would say, Let us bless the Lord and the people would respond with
Thanks be to God. But then the pastor would turn to the people and say, Bow
your hearts to God and receive the blessing. And then the blessing was given in
the first person plural. The pastor would say, The Lord bless us and keep us. The
Lord make his face shine upon us and be gracious to us. The Lord look upon us with
favor and give us eternal peace. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit. That then became the hallmark of the Swedish form of the Lutheran
Divine Service, that at the tale end of the Aaronic Benediction the Trinitarian Name
was interposed.
Can we speculate why he added the Trinitarian name and why it was a wise thing to
do? Some people thought it was rather shocking that a NT sacrament would end
with an OT benediction. We may not think in those terms today because we view
the entire OT as Christs book; its all about him. But back then things were different
and this might have been an issue. So the thought probably was to make sure that
people understood that the Lord who is blessing us is the Triune God. The God who

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we know through Jesus Christ the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the One who
blesses us and gives us eternal peace.
The Sacrament and Service End with Peace
Peace is the last word of the benediction, the last word of the service. Trace it out
and you will see that peace is used throughout the Sacrament.
The peace of the Lord be with you always.

The end of the Lamb of God is grant us peace.
At the end of the Supper, we are dismissed with Depart in peace.
In the song of Simeon we sing Lord, now let your servant go in peace.
And now the benediction ends with and give you peace.
With the Swedes adding the word eternal peace, they are stressing that this is not
just us getting out of trouble. Rather peace is us being able to calmly deal with
anything that comes our way. This is what the Sacrament has given to us. We can
walk out into the world with an unshakeable peace. We have tasted and seen that
God is for us. In the Sacrament he has come to us and given us the true body and
blood of Christ that wiped out our sin. Death has no power over us. And in addition
God has promised to use everything that life throws at us as a blessing. So knowing
this we confidently go back into the world in peace. No matter what happens, we
will not fear. The Lord of Hosts is with us.
Not a Wish But a Bestowal of Blessing
The wording of the benediction kind of sounds peculiar to us. We are tempted to put
the word may in front of it. Such as May the Lord bless and keep you. And
sometimes the word may is added and there is no ill intent in doing so. But the
word may connotes a wish. And this is not a wish. It is an is. The wording we use
mirrors the wording of the Hebrew itself. In Hebrew it is a command to God. It does
not translate to English very well.
Edgar Brown had a nice commentary on this. The last word of the service is
strongly sacramental. God is giving us something. This is not a prayer and the
pastor ought not try and improve the liturgy by adding the word may before the
benediction. This is a blessing from God. It is not conditional. People ought to expect
to receive Gods blessing as they go forth from the church. This was well said. He
points out the heart of the problem with the word may being added. It introduces
uncertainty. The benediction places Gods name upon you and you go forth as the
people of God blessed by him.
Gods Word is Performative

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This raises a couple of questions. First of all Gods word is powerful. His words do
what they say. This is Gods word. It accomplishes that which it says. Therefore
these words confer the blessing of Almighty God upon us. These words bestow the
favor of Almighty God. This is God keeping you. This is God lifting up his
countenance upon you.
Also remember how this ties to the very central calling of Abraham. God told
Abraham that he was going to bless him. God said he was going to make him a
blessing to the ends of the earth for all peoples. The blessing of Abraham comes to
fruition in Jesus. And now in Jesus God reaches out and brings the blessing of
Abraham finally to all peoples of the earth. Therefore we go forth as Gods people
who have been blessed. We walk out as blessed people. We have tasted the fullness
of Gods mercy and love. We know why we are here and where we are headed.
It was mentioned that Edgar Brown said that the benediction was sacramental. If he
is right that this blessing is sacramental, this isnt like saying, God bless you to
someone after they sneeze. This is a special blessing reserved for the people of
God.
Note that the speaking of the benediction is reserved for ordained clergy only, just
like they alone speak the words of institution, just like they alone speak the words
the Lord be with you, just like they alone speak the words of absolution. What do
all of these have in common? They are all performative words. The pastor is Gods
mouthpiece. When the pastor speaks, it is God speaking through him. God uses the
pastor to deliver a sure and certain gift.
Other Benedictions
Returning from a commercial break we heard the benediction set to music. Before
we get to some of our listener questions, outside of Lutheranism there are some
other benedictions. Here is a survey of some other benedictions.
The Roman Catholics: The blessing of Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit, be with you. Amen.
The Anglicans: The peace of God, which passes all understanding, will guard
your hearts and you minds in Christ Jesus. And the blessing of Almighty God,
the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be with you always.
The Eastern Orthodox: May the blessing of the Lord in his mercy come upon
you through his divine grace and love always now and forever and to the
ages of ages. Amen. Glory to you O God our hope. Glory to you. May Christ
our true God who rose from the dead as a good, loving, merciful God, have
mercy upon us and save us through the intercessions of his most pure and
holy mother. The power of the precious and most life-giving cross ... (It

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continues on for a while. It like they are so overjoyed they dont want the
service to end.)
Listener Questions
A listener commented that usually the first words that a newly ordained pastor gets
to speak are the words of the benediction. So the first words out of his mouth are
words of blessing. Yes thats true. And that is the work that he is entering into.
Pastors are there for the purpose of putting the blessing of God upon his people, to
deliver to the people the gifts of the Lord.
Off the air the pastors discussed the translation of the Aaronic Benediction. It is
translated differently in Divine Service 3 than it is in Divine Service 1,2, 4, and 5. So
is it look upon us with favor or is it lift up your countenance upon you? To lift
up your countenance means to smile at you. To look at you with favor means that
the Lord is looking at you in delight. This is the Father saying to us, You are my son
or daughter with whom I am well pleased. Either way God is smiling at us with
delight.
Also in the benediction the word you or us is used. When the pastor gives the
benediction he uses the word you. If a layperson gives the benediction, he will use
the word us. Similarly, if the layperson pronounces the salutation, he will not say
as the pastor does, The Lord be with you. Instead he will say, Lord hear my
prayer. This is a recognition that this person has not been recognized and set apart
by the church to speak authoritatively the words of God to us.
A listener question: Why does the Divine Service include the Aaronic Benediction
instead of the Pauline Benediction? In the Lutheran usage the Pauline benediction
has come to be use in Matins and Vespers. We do it this way simply because Dr.
Luther suggested it and that is what caught on in Lutheran churches. There is
nothing wrong with using a different benediction. The strength of the Aaronic
Benediction is that it anchors us in peace and blessing.
A listener question related to something we just discussed. Is the Aaronic
Benediction only to be used by the pastor in the liturgy or is it available to us to use
as Gods word? I think her question is this, Is it ok to use the Aaronic Benediction for
private devotional use or to use in your home to bless your children with? Yes, it is
absolutely ok to use at home. Thats a wonderful use of it. But again it should be
used in its plural form, using us instead of you. More questions after the break.
And we also need to discuss why we sing a hymn after God has had the final word.
More Listener Questions
Returning from the break we heard the benediction from Divine Service 2. Another
listener question. The pastor blesses the congregation and as he does so he makes

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the sign of the cross. Is it appropriate for the congregation to respond to the sign of
the cross by crossing themselves? Yes absolutely! Whenever the pastor gives the
sign of the cross, it is always appropriate for the people to mark themselves with
the sign of the cross. Originally again, only a bishop could make the sign of the
cross. Originally a simple pastor would hold up a cross towards the people. But over
time it became accepted that the pastor too could make the sign of the cross like
the bishop. And it is appropriate for the people to cross themselves when they are
blessed in this way. Doing so is a way of saying that this blessing is for me. Its like
an Amen.
[Other listener questions and statements.]
The Benediction Accompanies Us All Our Life
During the break the pastors talked to each other about what a blessing it is to
speak the Aaronic Benediction to individuals who are sick. In addition to that, it also
has its place in the accommodation of the dying. When a Christian is dying, this is
the Churchs blessing upon them. So the Aaronic Benediction accompanies us all of
our life.
The Aaronic Blessing Used in OT and NT Times
The Aaronic Benediction was used in worship at the temple. Do we know if it was
used in synagogue worship at the time of Christ and the early Christian Church? Yes
it was. Think about the story of Zechariah, John the Baptists father. The people
were waiting outside the temple for him to come out and give them the blessing. Of
course on that occasion he was not able to.
A Hymn After the Benediction
Pr. Wilken grew up in Texas. The tradition there was to sing the final hymn and then
have the benediction. That was the end of the service. Later he found out that most
Lutheran congregations switched these two around. They had the benediction and
then the final hymn. So there is probably some who are wondering why, after God
has blessed us, are we still singing? All of the liturgioligists would agree. There is no
concluding hymn for any of the LCMS Divine Services except for Service 5. Yet
before we leave we feel the need to say thank you to God one more time. We leave
the service and go back out into the world singing songs of praise and thanksgiving.
Singing erupts in the Church and there is nothing we can do to stop it.
The final hymn should have a certain character to it. Pr. Weedons suggestion is that
the last hymn be short and it should tend to be doxological. The blessed Trinity has
just spoken to us and given us his blessing, putting his name upon us. Therefore it is

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only fitting that having Gods name (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) placed upon us, we
then sing a hymn of praise back to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
The Divine Service Never Ends
Is the Divine Service ever really ended? No. Once the first Christians gathered in the
name of the Triune God, the Service never ends. We heard during the Service of the
Sacrament that it is meet , right, and salutary that we at all times and in all places
give thanks to God. This is what heaven will be like, but we get to start
participating in it right now. Our whole lives we receive Gods blessings and our
whole lives we thank God for them.
Session 24 Conclusion
Introduction
Today we conclude this long series on the historic liturgy. The liturgy is the living
voice of the Church. It is the life of the Church because in the liturgy our Lord freely
gives us the gift of life.
Doctrine and Practice
How the Church worships tells the world what it believes and confesses. Why is this
important? What the church does and says as it gathers together for worship
reveals what that church actually confesses about the Christian faith. In order to
shape people in the faith, we must practice the faith in our worship. What we
believe and how we worship go hand in hand.
The way we worship is a witness to the world and a witness to each other, but we
dont tend to think about it that way anymore. Why? Most people dont see the
liturgy this way. They think it is the opposite of a clear witness. They believe that
the liturgy is a stumbling block to the world. If there is a stumbling block, it is the
content of the Christian faith. And as a matter of fact, the Gospel is a stumbling
block to people. Take for example original sin. Tell people that we believe that all
people are conceived and born in sin, that we all by nature have a sinful nature, and
people will be offended. Tell people they were already a sinner before they
committed a sin and they will be offended. So then in the Divine Service when we
confess this in the Confession people get upset. The doctrine of original sin that we
believe is expressed clearly in the Confession is a witness to the world.

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Question about the Proclamation of Christ
We have a lot of listener questions. Here is a question about the Communion liturgy,
especially in the left hand column of Divine Services 1 and 2 in the Lutheran Service
Book (LSB). In these versions it proclaims Christ after the words of institution. After
the words of institution, the pastor says, As often as you eat this bread and drink
this cup you proclaim the Lords death until he comes. The listener likes this
proclamation. What has led our Synod to include it?
This is part of a complex issue of Eucharistic prayer. The proclamation, Christ has
died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again was part of many of the early
liturgies. When liturgical reform was happening in the Twentieth Century the LCMS
Lutherans could not agree if there should be anything around the words of
institution or not. Should the words of institution stand all by themselves as clear,
pure Gospel or should some of these other ancient pieces be included to remember
and proclaim Christ? It is interesting to note that when the proclamation of Christ is
made, we are addressing Jesus. He is present with us and we are talking to him.
We have talked about how the liturgy changes, but in a very glacial way. Sometimes
with these changes, something will drop out of the liturgy and then come back later.
Dr. Nagel used to say that the liturgy is like a bush. Sometimes it gets so bushy that
you cant see what its really all about. It gets hidden below. We have to do some
pruning so that what is important is clearly visible. But because it is a living thing, it
will always grow back.
Why We Use the Liturgy to Confirmation Students
Our next question is, What is the best way to explain why we use historic liturgy to
confirmation age students? At that age it is common for teenagers to question why
we say the same words over and over, week after week. One answer Pr. Weedon
gives to his confirmation students is, We want to prepare you to die. When you are
old and cant remember anymore, if the pastor says, Our Father, you know what
to say next. Even if youve forgotten your kids names or even your own name, when
you hear, Our Father, you know what comes next. We want you to know the words
of the liturgy, because they are of such great comfort, so they will go with you all
the way through the valley of the shadow of death. These are Gods Word and we
want them to integrated into the very fabric of your being. Many a pastor has had
this experience. You have someone with a terrible case of Alzheimers. They cant
remember anything. But they do remember the liturgy. This is the one time in their
life when they feel at home.
Another way of saying why we use the historic liturgy to confirmation students is
that we are giving you something to grow into and not grow out of. To illustrate this
with songs, you can teach your children Zacchaeus was a Wee Little Man or you

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can teach them The King of Love My Shepherd Is. Which one is going to be more
comforting when they walk through the valley of the shadow of death? The liturgy
does not wear out. It is useful always throughout life, all the way up to the grave.
Temple and Synagogue Establish the Pattern for Divine Service
The next question is, Does our liturgy go all the way back to the liturgy used by the
Jews in the temple and synagogue? Yes. It is not identical but the basic pattern was
established in that the Service of the Word corresponds to the service of the
synagogue and the Service of the Sacrament corresponds to the sacrifices of the
temple. By the way, there is a very good treatment of this in the book Heaven on
Earth by Dr. Just. He also put out a video series on the liturgy which is very good in
explaining the theology and thinking behind the structure of the service.
Specific Texts or Pattern to Follow
Another question is, Is the historic liturgy best described as a specific text one must
follow, such as the Gloria must follow the Kyrie, or as a pattern of worship where
any hymn of praise can follow any cry for mercy. The answer is yes and no. Primarily
the liturgy is ordered action. It should not be thought of primarily as a set of texts.
The liturgical families across the board have an enormous variety of texts
associated with the ordered action. By ordered action we mean that these are the
things that happen as God brings his people together. This is how God dishes out his
gifts. He dishes them out in this order. He gives out his gifts in the Word, which
follows the pattern of OT, Psalm, Epistle, and Gospel, with the Gospel as the climax.
This is followed by the proclamation of the Word in the sermon, the offering of
prayers for the world, the collection of offerings, the blessing of bread and wine with
thanksgiving with the words of Jesus, and the distribution as his body and blood.
This order is solid. It shapes the liturgy. It is the skeletal structure of the liturgy. It
runs underneath all of the eastern liturgies and all of the western liturgies.
Can it be thought of in the following way? You have a five course meal where you
have five separate courses. Each course has a function that it serves within the
whole meal, but they are not there to stand by themselves. Yes, that is a good way
to think about it. They are there not to compete with each other, but to complement
each other. You follow this order where each course is enjoyed but each course also
helps you enjoy the next course. Each course adds to the whole meal. The liturgy
provides the fundamentals of Divine Service Word and Sacrament.
If you go back to our thinking of the main parts of the liturgy as a skeleton, then the
texts are the flesh that goes on the bones. But we must be careful because certain
parts of the flesh are more important than others. This reminds me of another
listener question. If you pare back the liturgy, can you reach a point where you pare
back so much that it ceases to be the historic liturgy? Some might think back to the

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Lutheran Reformation where some paring was done. There was some paring back
but in actuality not very much. The one area where it was pared back was the area
right around the words of institution. Some of the man-made words were removed,
intentionally making Gods words front and center. The question was how much
praise and thanksgiving and how the praise and thanksgiving should surround Gods
words.
Across time, the liturgy has expanded and contracted. There is no pristine form of
the liturgy that was established by the apostles, which has remained in use
throughout the centuries.
Speaking the Liturgy
Here is another question. When and why did the practice of speaking the liturgy
come about? The practice of speaking the liturgy is actually very old for what the
western church calls the private mass, that is, for mass celebrated by the priest
himself. By the time of the Reformation the people were quite familiar with both the
spoken form and the sung form. Standard Lutheran practice for a long time was to
sing the mass. Everything was sung except for the sermon. Even the readings were
sung. In our day of course speaking is more prevalent and this was helped along by
Vatican II where Roman Catholics could speak the liturgy.
A brief side question. We do a lot of singing in our services, which includes the
pastor. What if the pastor really cannot sing? Should he still attempt to sing his
parts of the service? This singing is in the form of a chant. So first of all, the pastor
needs to try and get some help on how to chant. Some people dont think they can
chant but they really can. But if they really cant, if they are tone deaf, then there is
no need to chant. Speaking is ok. So that raises another question, if the pastor
speaks his part, should the people speak instead of chant? It is still ok for the people
to sing.
Limited Musical Resources
A listener asks, Can you provide some kind of guidance on how a small
congregation with limited musical resources and with a pastor with limited singing
ability can take full advantage of the Divine Services in Lutheran Service Book? First
I would have a Bible Study on the liturgy. I would use the video series on the Divine
Service we mentioned earlier in this session put together by Dr. Art Just. Secondly,
the pastor must become very familiar with the rubrics. The pastor should actually
take the time to study the Altar Book and how you do the services. It can help in
providing variety and different ways of doing the liturgy. For instance, most people
dont know that during Lent most of the beginning part of the service could be
replaced with the Great Litany.

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Really quickly, David Peterson, one of the frequent guests on Issues Etc., says that
pastors should rehearse. Is this a good idea? Yes. The pastor should be so
comfortable with what he is doing that it should come naturally without much
thinking about it. The pastor should think about everything ahead of time so that
there are no surprises. When there is a surprise it draws the people away from God
and his Word and his Gifts and focuses them on something else. Rehearsing is a
great idea.
Thirdly, the pastor should find a musician friend, someone who can help him
through the music. Fourthly, Lutheran Service Builder has a tool that will let you
hear how a tune goes. But even it cannot replace having someone at the pastors
side who can help him musically.
Liturgy and the Holy Spirit
A listener says that he often hears others ask, Doesnt following a set liturgy deny
the freedom of the Holy Spirit to direct the worship service as he sees fit and to
respond to the needs of the congregants in different situations? That is a great
question. The Holy Spirit binds himself to the Word of God. The Spirit promises that
where the Word is read and proclaimed he will be active. The liturgy is the historic
way the Church has found for the Holy Spirit to be active through the Word of God.
How amazing is it, that following the lessons for the day, it nails the particular
situation for people. It happens time and time again. So rather than the pastor
thinking he knows what the people need to hear, by following the Churchs liturgy,
we just let the Word of God determine what we are going to hear and because it is
full of the Spirit, it is quite relevant.
What the Liturgy is Based On
A listener asks, What exactly is our liturgy based on? Can we trace each sentence in
the liturgy back to the Scriptures as the Eastern Orthodox claim to or is our liturgy
based on traditions that arose out of synagogues and early churches? In the
Lutheran Service Book, each part of the service has references to Bible passages
that it is based on. There are certainly lines in the liturgy, in the Collects and so
forth, that do not come directly from the Scriptures, but almost everything in the
shape of the liturgy and almost all of the canticles come from the Scriptures.
Everything in the service is scriptural in a broad sense. Some things in the liturgy
are taken from various parts of the Scriptures and not from just one passage.
The Liturgy is Like God Kissing Us It Never Gets Old
Another listener says, Some people have told him that doing the same thing every
Sunday would get old and boring. He asked that friend if he kissed his wife every
day? He said, Yes. He asked him, Does it ever get old and boring? He said, No. He

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went on to tell him, Using the liturgy is like kissing the face of God. What do you
make of his apologetic for the liturgy? Its great! If I were to dare to try and improve
upon it, I would say that the liturgy is like God kissing our face. It never gets old or
boring.
Lectionary for Daily Devotions
A listener comments, Having been convinced from this program that it is a good
idea to have my daily devotions based on a lectionary, I like the idea of having my
devotions tied to what I hear on Sunday. However the Lutheran Service Book does
not have a lectionary like the old Lutheran Hymnal. So I use the Lutheran Hymnal.
But [now with changes to the lectionary] there are differences between the
lectionary that I follow and the readings I hear on Sunday morning. What should I
do? First of all the Lutheran Service Book does have a lectionary in it in the first few
pages of the book. Then you need to find out what your church is using. Is it the one
year or three year lectionary? If they are using the one year lectionary, then the
readings are the same every year. If they are using the three year lectionary, then
you need to find out which year we are in A, B, or C. A chart in front of the hymnal
will tell you what the readings are. You can also check out the Treasury of Daily
Prayer. It does not use the reading for each Sunday, but it does keep the readings
for the season of the Church Year.
With a short amount of time, what do you make of his notion of tying daily
devotions to the Sunday readings? I like it very much. It is the pattern followed at
the International Center. Tuesday we use the OT lesson. Thursday we use the Epistle
lesson. And Friday is the Gospel from the previous Sunday.
Gender Neutral Language in the Liturgy
A caller asked Pastor Weedon if he was familiar with a book called Evangelical
Lutheran Worship published by Augsburg Fortress. Apparently they use a number of
references to what is called gender neutral language. Do you have any insight on
how to evaluate this? Pr. Weedon has a copy of it and to be honest he says it is a
train wreck. The gender neutral translation of the psalms and the strange
paraphrasing is problematic. Having 10 different orders of service is also too many.
How to Educate People on the Liturgy
Another listener asks, Given all the historical evidence that the liturgy is based on
Scripture alone and that it has been used by countless believers for thousands of
years, why does a committee of laymen, which is typical in many congregations,
think they can improve on the liturgy? Is it really something new and different that
they want or is it a lack of understanding the reason why the liturgy is used that
makes their worship less meaningful? How do people who love the historic liturgy

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get others to see their ignorance without seeming high-brow? That too is a great
question. I will say it again. Get your pastor to do the video series by Arthur Just. It
will go a long way to help the core people who are in your adult Bible class to
understand the liturgy. In Pr. Weedons experience once Lutheran laity understand
the liturgy then its like the light bulb turns on. Theyve done this all their life but
they havent really understood it. And once they understand it, they get excited
about it and they will never let it go. It is a travesty when a pastor abdicates that to
a committee of lay people. It is great for lay people to have active participation in
the shaping of the worship life of the church. But actually being involved in how to
do what is not what they should be doing. That is what the pastor should be doing.
Communion Every Sunday
A caller had two questions. (1) If you are thinking of the service as a five course
meal, then it seems to me that the Lords Supper would be the main course. What
do you think about having the Lords Supper every week as part of the liturgy? Can
you tell me why or why not that may or may not be appropriate? (2) My other
question has to do with why some parts of the liturgy are sung and others are
spoken? Singing is a great memory tool. When you sing something it engrains it in
your mind and you dont forget it. So if a pastor is a bad singer, it would almost
seem like even a better reason for him to sing. Who would forget that?
What about every Sunday Communion? Our synod has repeatedly encouraged our
congregations to move towards Communion every Sunday. Now that does not mean
that every person needs to commune every Sunday. It means that every Sunday in
every congregation the Lords Supper should be offered for those people who desire
and need it on that particular Sunday. I would guess that about 50% of LCMS
congregations have Communion every Sunday. This number will probably continue
to grow. When you realize what the Lords Supper is, you ask yourself, Why would I
not want Communion every Sunday?
[They forgot about the second question and did not discuss it.]
God Comes to Us in the Liturgy
Another listener comments: What we do in church is not about ourselves. It is
pleasing to God. What we do is what the disciples gave to the early church and that
was given to them by God. What the Holy Spirit does is give us the ability to speak
wisely and to relay the message of Christ to the masses. I believe you dont really
know how great the liturgy is until you have crises in your life then you will find the
comfort that it brings. It is not God coming to us. He did this with the gift of his Son.
It is that we need to conform to the wishes that please him. If God is an omnipotent
being, he has not changed. So it is the Scriptures and the true meaning that we
need to follow.

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Pr. Weedon, how would you tweak or correct what he has said? I would say that the
liturgy is indeed God coming to us. In one sense it is not an incarnation, but in
another sense it is. The Spirit continues to deliver to us the very flesh of our Lord
Jesus Christ. He comes to us in the Word that the Spirit inspired. He comes to us in
the gift of the Sacrament of the Altar with the same body and blood that were born
of Mary. So in the liturgy Jesus does indeed come to us to give us salvation.
Future Changes to the Liturgy
Another listener question. How do you see the historic liturgy continuing to evolve
over the next couple of generations in the west if at all? Not contemporary changes,
but adjustments like weve seen in the past. That is a good question.
Prognosticating on the future of the liturgy could be very foolish. For instance, who
would thought that the Gloria, this age old canticle, would have gotten bumped in
many of our congregations by This Is the Feast? And yet that has happened. Or
earlier in our lifetime, I would not have thought that the Eucharist would once again
be held on a weekly basis. But it has. It is hard to even guess. Maybe we will see
more psalm singing. I most definitely believe that the explosion of hymns is going to
continue. In the last 25 years weve had a real hymn revival.
Liturgy is Life
With just a minute and half left, Pr. Weedon, you want everyone to know that the
historic liturgy is not just a blip but it is life. What do you mean? In the Divine
Service heaven touches earth, heaven comes to us to transform our lives. Our lives
become praise and thanksgiving to God. The Divine Service opens our eyes to see
the gifts of God that are showered down around us 24 hours 7 days a week and
teaches us how to open our mouths to proclaim the praises of the One who is
showering and lavishing his love on us. Are you saying that liturgy is life and life is
liturgy? Yes. Life is always liturgical. Life is always lived in the reception of the Lords
gifts. In the recognition of them, ones life becomes orthodox liturgy. It becomes
true liturgy; the liturgy reaches its point and purpose in our lives. We realize we
exist, as St. Paul says, to be for the praise of his glory.
Conclusion Jesus Christ is Our Life
It is true. Life is a gift from God. And the life he gives, he gives through Jesus Christ.
And he gives that life through his Word. And that Word is found on Sunday morning
where he gathers his people to give them life in Jesus Christ. And he gives it to us
through the forgiveness of sins. He gives it to us through his Word that comes to
those elements and delivers to us sacramentally the same forgiveness of sins, the
same Jesus Christ. It is the same thing as saying Jesus Christ is our life.

An Issues Etc. Series On The Historic Liturgy: Session 1 - Introduction

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An Issues Etc. Series On The Historic Liturgy: Session 1 - Introduction

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An Issues Etc.

Series on the Historic Liturgy

Defining Historic Liturgy

An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy

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Session 4 - The Introit and Gloria Patri

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Session 5 The Kyrie

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Retaining the Music of the Kyrie

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Session 6 The Gloria

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(A couple of questions from listeners.)

A High Point in the Liturgy

Session 7 The Alternate Hymn of Praise: Worthy is Christ

An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy

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Session 8 The Salutation and Collect

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Collect for Epiphany 4: ... we cannot stand upright ...

Collects are Always We Prayers and Not I Prayers

An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy

On Christmas dawn: we your people.

An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy

Session 9: The Old Testament Reading

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Session 10: The Gradual and Alleluia

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Session 11: The Epistle and Gospel

An Issues Etc. Series on the Historic Liturgy