Greetings in Christ!

Holy Week leads us down the path from Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, all the way to the cross. Each day focuses on a different event of that final week leading up to the sorrow of his death and then to the joy of his resurrection!

I look forward to joining you for these services as we hear God’s Word and sing His praises.

If you have questions or ever just need to chat, please let me know!

Have a great day and God bless.

In Christ,
Pastor Merritt

You can take a look through the service folders as you prepare for each service.

Take a moment to listen to Issues, Etc. as they discuss the liturgical details of the next couple days of the church year.

Here are the liturgical summaries for each of the services.

Maundy Thursday:

Exodus 24:3–11 or Exodus 12:1–14
1 Corinthians 10:16–17 or 1 Corinthians 11:23–32
Mark 14:12–26 or John 13:1–17, 31b–35

Let Us Love One Another, as Christ Has Loved Us and Loves Us to the End

“The LORD’s Passover” (Ex. 12:11) and “the blood of the covenant” at Mount Sinai (Ex. 24:8) are preeminent types of the Lord’s Supper. The blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, now covers us, and we keep His Supper “as a feast to the LORD” (Ex. 12:13–14). In Him, we see “the God of Israel” (Ex. 24:10), and yet He does not lay His hand on us to punish us. As disciples of Jesus, we recline at the table with Him to eat and drink in peace (Mark 14:18). The apostles, who received the New Testament in His blood “on the night when he was betrayed,” delivered the same to His Church, which we also now receive in remembrance of Him (1 Cor. 11:23–26; Mark 14:22–25). So He has “loved his own who were in the world,” and He loves us “to the end” (John 13:1). As He thus feeds us in love, let us love one another, just as He has loved us (John 13:34). For “we who are many are one body” because “we all partake of the one bread,” which is the body of Christ (1 Cor. 10:17).

Good Friday:

Isaiah 52:13—53:12
Hebrews 4:14–16; 5:7–9
John 18:1—19:42 or John 19:17–30

Behold the Lamb of God, Who Takes Away the Sin of the World

Jesus, the Lamb of God, is led to the slaughter of His cross as the Sacrifice of Atonement for the sin of the world. “Despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Is. 53:3), He is the righteous Servant who justifies many by His innocent suffering and death. He bears our griefs and sorrows; He is wounded for our transgressions; He is crushed for our iniquities; He suffers our chastisement; “and with his wounds we are healed” (Is. 53:4–5). As the Son of God, He fulfills the Law for us in human flesh, and so fulfills the Scriptures (John 19:7, 24). In perfect faith and faithfulness, He shares all our weaknesses and temptations, “yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15). As our merciful High Priest, He brings us to the Father in peace, “makes intercession for the transgressors” (Is. 53:12) and joins our prayers to His own, so that we are heard “because of his reverence” (Heb. 5:7). From His cross, He gives us His Spirit (John 19:30), washes us with water from His side and covers us with His blood (John 19:34).

Easter Sunday at Sunrise:

Exodus 15:1–11
1 Corinthians 5:6b–8
John 20:1–18

The Risen Lord Jesus Is Our Strength and Our Song, for He Has Become Our Salvation

O come, let us “sing to the LORD, for he has triumphed gloriously” (Ex. 15:1). By His cross, He has shattered the enemy, crushing sin and death beneath His feet; in His resurrection, He has brought us out of Egypt into the freedom of the Gospel. He has called us out of darkness into light, and led us from confusion, fear and weeping into the joy and gladness of His resurrection. He is our strength and our song, and He has become our salvation (Ex. 15:2). Thus do we hear and respond to His voice of the Gospel, as He calls each of us by name. We enter His tomb by our Baptism into His death, and just as surely as He has risen, so we also “must rise from the dead” (John 20:9). “Let us therefore celebrate the festival” (1 Cor. 5:8), not in the revelry of self-indulgence or in the debauchery of lust, but in sincere faith and genuine love. For “Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Cor. 5:7). He has thereby set us free from sin and death, and now He feeds us with Himself unto life everlasting.

Easter Sunday:

Isaiah 25:6–9
1 Corinthians 15:1–11
Mark 16:1–8

The Risen Christ Has Swallowed Up Death Forever!

The entire fallen world is veiled in a funeral shroud “that is spread over all nations” and “cast over all peoples” (Is. 25:7). But the Lord of hosts, in the Person of the incarnate Son, Jesus Christ, has removed that terrible pall and swallowed up death forever. By submitting Himself to death, He burst it apart from the inside out. Now He wipes away all tears from our faces, and He invites us to “be glad and rejoice in his salvation” (Is. 25:9). His body and His blood, crucified and risen, are given and poured out for us as a feast “of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined” (Is. 25:6). We enter that feast through Holy Baptism, whereby our old man is buried with Jesus Christ, and we are raised up in Him, “dressed in a white robe” of His perfect righteousness (Mark 16:5). What St. Paul and the other apostles received “by the grace of God” is also “delivered to you” by the preaching of Christ, “in which you stand, and by which you are being saved” (1 Cor. 15:1–11).

Published by pastordemski