August 23, 2020.
Worship Begins at 10:30 a.m. – Connect with us through Zoom https://zoom.us/j/673028163, Meeting ID: 673 028 163, OR for audio only, call +19292056099, (enter code 673028163). Check Facebook (Calvary Moravian Church Allentown) for service by 12 p.m.
We are also offering an outside worship service at 9 a.m. (please bring your own chair, wear a mask, and observe all social distancing protocol).
Thank you for listening, participating or worshipping with us at Calvary Moravian Church. To support our ministries, you can mail the office a check (948 N. 21st St. Allentown 18104). An online giving portal is at https://mmfa.info/calvary-moravian-church-pa-donation-form/.
Liturgy for Reconciliation pg. 13 (Moravian Hymnal, used with permission).
With joyfulness and longing We look to you, O Lord;
Receive us in your mercy, And cheer us with your word.
Crown us with love enduring, And promises of grace,
And let your holy blessing, Remain within this place.
The years have all been crowded, With tokens of your love;
And many who have sought you, Now worship you above.
But we, O Lord, still need you, Our pilgrim feet to stay,
For evil often triumphs, As faith to fear gives way.
Almighty God, enthroned above all, you alone are God over the nations of the earth. Even the planets, the stars, and the galaxies are placed by your hand.
Where could we go from your Spirit? Where could we flee from your presence? If we go up to the heavens, you are there; if we go down into the caves of the earth or the depths of the sea, you are there.
God of all creation, we sing praises to your name; we stand jubilant before your glory, power, and beauty.
God of certainty, God of truth, our confidence is in you and in you alone.
Yet we live in a fallen world and we are an imperfect people.
Our world is filled with pain and alienation.
We know of illness when body or mind is failing, and the loneliness of spirit it brings.
We know of separation from parent or child, from friend or neighbor, and the emptiness of life it brings.
We know of strangeness in new communities and in changing communities, and the longing it brings.
We know of alienation caused by unemployment or poverty or discrimination, and the pain it brings.
We have become strangers to our relatives, and foreigners to our own families.
How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? Let our cry for help come to you.
I am a God nearby, says the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? I am the Lord your God. I have called you out from the peoples and you shall be holy to me.
We declare your praise, the One who called us out of darkness into your wonderful light. We are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to you.
Sing praise to God, who reigns above, The God of all creation,
The God of power, the God of love, The God of our salvation;
With healing balm my soul he fills, And every faithless murmur stills.
To God all praise and glory!
The Lord is never far away, But through all grief distressing,
An ever-present help and stay, Our peace, and joy, and blessing,
As with a mother’s tender hand, He leads his own, his chosen band.
To God all praise and glory!
Silent Confession
Gracious God, we humbly confess that we walk in the way of the indifferent, who depend on their strength alone. We sit among the scornful, who deny the need for your guidance and power. Our hearts are not satisfied with riches vulnerable to moth and rust and thief, yet we zealously store up those very treasures. Set our minds on things unseen and eternal, that our emptiness within may be filled.
We humbly confess that we fail to welcome the stranger among us. We pass by the neighbor who is hungry and thirsty, naked, sick, and in prison. We sing of your healing power and your unconditional love, but we fail to make our sanctuaries true havens for the suffering and the exiled. Give us the will to be ambassadors for our Savior and faithful stewards of the ministry of reconciliation entrusted to us.
Lord, have mercy on us. Amen.
Without Christ we were strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus we who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. He is our peace.
We are no longer strangers and aliens, but citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, with Christ himself as the cornerstone.
Therefore, let us affirm our faith in the Triune God.
We believe in the one God who has created the land and sea and heavens and all that is in them; who established a world that was good; who gives to us the task of watchful and responsible care over it; who is certainty and truth.
We believe in the one God who in Jesus Christ assumed our humanity and knew our life as child, youth, and adult; who dined with sinners and lived with the homeless; who confronted popular opinion and power; who remained obedient in temptation and suffering; whose triumph was a servant’s death and resurrection.
We believe in the one God who comes to us as comforter and advocate; who does not leave us as orphans; who brings peace and calms the troubled heart; who bestows gifts for serving, healing, showing compassion, and doing miracles; who alone is the power and the wisdom of our proclamation.
Let us in faith keep our eyes fixed on the promises of God, though we see them and greet them from a distance.
We confess that we are strangers and foreigners on the earth, a people who are seeking our true home.
We desire a better place, that is, a heavenly one. Indeed, God has prepared a city for us.
Let us lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.
O then what raptured greetings, On Canaan’s happy shore;
What knitting severed friendships up, Where partings are no more!
Then eyes with joy shall sparkle, That brimmed with tears of late,
Orphans no longer fatherless, Nor widows desolate.
Bring near your great salvation, O Lamb for sinners slain;
Fill up the roll of your elect, Then take your power, and reign!
Appear, Desire of nations, Your exiles long for home;
Show in the heaven your promised sign; Great Prince and Savior, come.
Prayers of the People
Pastoral Prayer/Lord’s Prayer.
Scripture Exodus 1:8-2:10, Matthew 16:13-20.
Special Music. The Right Hand of God (found in hymnal 491).
Sermon. Rev. Dr. Riddick Weber.
Hymn 694. The Church of Christ, In Every Age.
Benediction.
Calvary Moravian Church 