Jesus is Lord

Liturgy Lesson – October 25, 2020

Morning Worship
Call to Worship: 1 Chronicles 29:10-13; Exodus 15:18
Prayer of Invocation
Hymn of Adoration: Crown Him with Many Crowns (#295, Trinity Hymnal)
Confession: prayer
Assurance of Pardon: Ps. 33:13-22
Hymn of Assurance: My Soul Finds Rest in God Alone
Catechism/Prayers
Reading of the Word: Luke 20:19-26
Doxology: #731
Sermon: Rev. Eric Irwin
Meditation
Celebration of the Lord’s Supper: Jesus is Lord; Crown Him with Many Crowns (alternate verses)
Benediction

Evening Worship
Call to Worship: Ps. 33:1-12
Hymn: Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing
Pastoral Prayer
Testimony and Song: The Steadfast Love of the Lord
Reading of the Word: TBD
Homily: Rev. Eric Irwin
Communion: My Worth is Not in What I Own; My Heart is Filled with Thankfulness
Benediction

After a long hiatus, Liturgy Lessons are back! I assume this is only mildly exciting news for most of you; however, for those devoted few who have been waiting for three months with breathless anticipation, for those anxious souls who have been left wondering “wherefore and wither hath the weekly wit flown?”, this is a glad tiding of great joy, which shall be to a few people.

I normally resume these writings each September, after a much-needed summer break. Why the extra month delay this year? I really couldn’t say, other than to tell you that the inspiration and inkwell both ran dry in the late summer and early fall. This is probably because of PTSD – Pandemic Tension and Stress Disorder. When the COVID-19 arrived on American shores back in the late winter, it hit like a tidal wave. Its surge across the country set off a spate of closures that eventually drowned the performing arts. It was the shutdown that shut up the music. Seven months later and Broadway is still Frozen. The Metropolitan opera has halted all shows until September 2021. The only one left singing is the Fat Lady. And she is singing a dirge.

Despite the loss of gigs and income, I have been grateful to be able to pour my creative energies into the church work. When the big, bad pandemic showed up at our church doors back in March – beating its chest, huffing and puffing, threatening to blow the house down – the CPC leadership responded with great vigor and vigilance. It has been a joy to partner with the pastors, deacons, elders, musicians, and tech team as we struggled to keep the ship afloat in time of storm. It really has been all hands on deck.

For thirteen Sundays (including Easter), we gathered in an eerily quiet and empty sanctuary to stream our worship services live into your homes. At the close of each service, we watched a “virtual narthex,” pre-recorded greetings in lieu of actual fellowship. Those three months were indescribably surreal. While the world focused on mitigating the spread of the virus, we were determined to do our part to mitigate detachment from worship and each other.

Summer brought relief. On June 21st (Father’s Day) we started in-person gatherings for morning and evening (outdoor) worship. We then entered a fairly quiet holding pattern through September, where an extended (and now never-ending) phase 2 allowed up to a hundred souls to secure a digital ticket for either morning or evening services. Again, surreal. Throughout the summer, we brought our own chairs and bulletins, learned some awkward new dance steps with communion, and, despite the masked and hugless atmosphere, we showed some good ol’ fashioned Presbyterian perseverance. Two weeks ago, the fall weather forced our evening service inside, where it will hopefully stay cozy through the winter. And now, in hopes that no worshipper is turned away, we are moving to two morning services starting this Sunday (9 and 11 a.m.; the latter is live-streamed). This is in addition to the evening service (6:30 p.m.).

Covenant Presbyterian Church has, in the span of a little more than seven months, gone from one combined worship gathering in a full sanctuary (do you remember what the congregational singing sounded like at near capacity?) to three separate services throughout the day. This prolonged moment has put the body of Christ on the rack, threatening to dislodge, dislocate, and even dis-member Christians from their churches. It may be that this is one of the most damaging long-term side effects of COVID. For all the rancor that 2020 has wrought, we Christians must remember that our most grievous problems are not physical, social, economic, or political, but spiritual.

“Surely one of the greatest problems of our times is that we have become so nonchalant about the Lord of the cosmos. Certainly if we were more immersed in God’s splendor we would find ourselves thoroughly ‘lost in wonder, love, and praise.’ With all the amazing sights and sounds of our cyberspace world, however, many of us no longer recognize that if we but catch a glimpse of GOD – the imperial Lord of the cosmos, the almighty King of the universe – we will be compelled to fall on our faces. Our awareness of the God’s absolute otherness would give us the sense that we could die now because we have seen God. We would shout with the prophet, “Woe is me, for I am annihilated” (Is. 6:5, Martin Luther’s rendering). – Marva Dawn, “A Royal ‘Waste’ of Time’”

Oh, that we all would be ‘lost in wonder, love, and praise.’ John Piper has said that “Missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exist because worship doesn’t.” Let me revise Piper in a time of pandemic. “Physical safety is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. The ultimate goal of the church is not to gain (nor preserve and protect) members, but to form worshippers, people who are in love with Jesus.” Anyone who has read Revelation knows that the story ends with ecstatic, extravagant, exuberant, euphoric expressions of ESSENTIAL praise to the Eternal God. Our gathered worship is but a foretaste of that feast yet to come. All of us with unmasked faces and renewed bodies will inhale the out-and-out pure air of that ‘healthful shore.’ We will sing of Him whose death saved us from the “second death” (Rev. 20:14). We will laud the Lamb whose spilled blood pours abundant life into our veins. The bliss and the beauty will be beyond belief. Our weekly worship, even with all the restrictions in place, still beckons us toward this reality. The trumpet may be muted, but it is still sounding.

For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
“Death is swallowed up in victory.”
“O death, where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?”

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain!
– 1 Cor. 15:52-58

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Jesus is Lord
Words and Music by Stuart Townend and Keith Getty, 2003

We have one relatively new hymn this week. It’s a fabulous footnotes version of the gospel story. In four quick, sweeping gestures across the canvas, this hymn paints a very accessible arc of the life, death, resurrection, and return of Christ. This is pithy praise at its best!

It is one of the earlier collaborations between Keith Getty & Stuart Townend, written in quite a traditional hymn-like format. They describe singing this hymn as a celebration that “traces the God of creation, the giving Jesus as a humble sacrifice, His glorious resurrection, and His ultimate return”

‘Jesus is Lord’ – the cry that echoes through creation:
Resplendent power, eternal Word, our Rock,
The Son of God, the King whose glory fills the heavens,
Yet bids us come to taste this living Bread.

‘Jesus is Lord’ – a shout of joy, a cry of anguish,
As He returns, and every knee bows low.
Then every eye and every heart will see His glory,
The Judge of all will take His children home.

– Sheet music
– Recording