Sermon at Epiphany Lutheran Church, Racine WI on Sunday February 25, 2018

Prayer of the Church Second Sunday in Lent 25 February 2018 Our Father in heaven, continue to establish Your saving covenant with us as You did with Abraham, that we who surely deserve nothing from You may rely on You for everything. While we were still Your enemies, at the right time You gave Your Son to die for us. Grant us repentant hearts and faith that rejoices that His death has reconciled us to You. Our Father in heaven, be with those who pass through difficult times and know sickness or heartache, loneliness or despair [including _______________]. Heal each one as You know best. Provide for those who lack money, home or the necessities of life. In every time of testing, teach Your children to hold tightly to You in faith, that in the end they may know the comfort of Your love. Our Father in heaven, You know the many temptations with which the world would snare us and draw us away from trust in You. Set our minds not on the things of man but on the things of God. Grant each of us a faith that confesses with joy that Jesus is the Christ. And also give us faith to daily deny ourselves, take up our crosses and follow Him. Pour out Your Spirit on those who proclaim Jesus here and throughout the world [including _______________]. Bring those who do not know or trust His love also to believe and rejoice in the reconciliation our Savior accomplished for all by His blood. Our Father in heaven, prepare the hearts of those who receive Christ’s body and blood this day. With our Savior in us through this Eucharist, grant us a peace that rejoices even in sufferings. By Your gracious working, let those sufferings produce endurance in us, let endurance produce character, and let character produce the hope that is never ashamed because You have poured Your love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.

Misspeaking About Miscarriage https://answersingenesis.org/sanctity-of-life/misspeaking-about-miscarriage/?utm_source=articlesmedia&utm_medium=email&utm_content=2-banner-cta&utm_campaign=20180217&mc_cid=28df4d7878&mc_eid=f40c465fe1

Cherish the child By Jason Nelson It is unfathomable that a loving mother would take her seven-year-old daughter to a border crossing and tell her to head north because the child would be better off wandering alone in the U.S. than remaining in her violent town in Central America. How desperate a mother’s love can be. It is equally unfathomable that our divine Father would send his only Son from heaven to be enfleshed in misery on earth and then forsake him on a cross. How amazing the Father’s love is for his adopted children. As a baby, the Son of God became a political refugee. He spent his life on earth as a displaced person. “The Son of Man has no place to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20). The nativity of Jesus isn’t a charming story of humble beginnings on a starlit night. It is a case in point of the harsh conditions and poverty so many children live in. It was the necessary beginning of Christ’s humiliating journey to redeem us. Much of the world is still unfit for children. Eighty percent of humanity lives on less than $10 a day. As a result, 22,000 children die quietly every 24 hours because they are meek, weak, and last in line (according to UNICEF). The meek and holy Child said of them, “Their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father” (Matthew 18:10). If we love him, we must show the world how to cherish them.

A prayer for this morning: Almighty God, look with favor on your humble servants and stretch out the right hand of your power to defend us against all our enemies; through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

A prayer for this morning: Almighty God, you see that we have no power to defend ourselves. Guard and keep us both outwardly and inwardly from all adversities that may happen to the body and from all evil thoughts that may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Jesus came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?” Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” John 4:5-14 Spiritual Water Was Jesus really that desperate for water? Yes, he was tired. Yes, he was thirsty. But was he really tired enough to ask a Samaritan for a drink? The Jews considered Samaritans their religious inferiors. The Samaritans were idolaters! Jews hated them, and they hated Jews! Was he really thirsty enough to ask a woman for a drink? It was against Rabbinic law to speak to any woman in public, not to mention a habitual adulterer like this woman was (see John 4:16-18)! Couldn’t Jesus have drawn his own water to drink? Or couldn’t he at least have found someone of better character to ask? Was Jesus really that desperate for water? The simplest answer is that Jesus wasn’t really that desperate for water. But that answer completely misses Jesus’ reason for asking the question. Jesus did not approach this sinful Samaritan woman on this day because he was desperate for physical water. He approached her because he knew that shewas desperate for spiritual water…and he was the only one who could give it to her: “Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst.” Of course, the “water” Jesus offered this woman was himself—his life-giving words and his life-saving work as the world’s Savior from sin. And, as the world’s Savior from sin, that also meant Jesus was her Savior from sin. And so, Jesus was not going to let anything—not race, not gender, not a sin-filled past, not a sin-filled present—get in his way of giving her exactly what she needed. He gave her himself, a “spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Dear friends, you are no different than this sinful Samaritan woman. Just like her, your sins have left you with a desperate need for a Savior. And, just like her, Jesus knows it. That’s why Jesus offers you, too, the life-giving water of himself. He offers it to you every day in his Word. For in his Word you, too, can hear his life-giving words. In his Word you, too, can take in his life-saving work as the world’s Savior—as your Savior—from sin. In his Word you, too, have access to a “spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Never miss an opportunity to drink him in! Prayer: Lord Jesus, you are the living water that gives life to thirsty souls. Increase our faith in you, that we may never go thirsty again. Amen.

You can read Pastor Zarling's sermon on battling temptation in the wilderness.

If You Don't Go to Church, You Won't Go to Heaven! https://www.1517legacy.com/1517blog/bobhiller/ifyoudontgotochurch?utm_source=1517+Master+List&utm_campaign=c23a1702c7-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_15&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_6c72dc38f5-c23a1702c7-462348993&mc_cid=c23a1702c7&mc_eid=dcf8980a8e

How Liturgical Are Today’s Christians? https://www.barna.com/research/liturgical-todays-christians/?utm_source=Barna+Update+List&utm_campaign=2a51b522fd-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_12_28&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8560a0e52e-2a51b522fd-172074809&mc_cid=2a51b522fd&mc_eid=98fe378a30

Our opening hymn for this Sunday.

The Lamb of God died for you now By Pastor Mark Jeske No Israelite who had participated in the giving of a sin offering or guilt offering could possibly mistake the message of the divine drama: God’s mercy is brokered through a substitute’s death. Jesus Christ did many wonderful things during his 33 short years on this earth. He taught people the Word of God. He healed the sick and even raised the dead. He gathered and trained 12 disciples who would continue the work when he was gone. He obeyed all the laws of God, Israel, and Rome. But the greatest of all his works was to offer himself as a guilt offering for the world. His cross on Calvary was the greatest of all the altars. The lifeblood he lost is our gain, for it is attributed to us through faith in him. Already at the very beginning of his ministry, his advance agent, John the Baptist, pointed people to Jesus and clarified the Savior’s holy mission: “The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’” (John 1:29). This is why we don’t need to offer up slain animals anymore. Christ has been there, done that. The animals were temporary props, indicators pointing ahead. The Great Lamb is here. Say this to yourself: “Jesus Christ once and for all has taken away all of my sin.”