Easter
The fullness of the resurrection requires more than a day to unpack. The Easter season is a fifty-day celebration that ends on Pentecost Sunday (the Greek word pentekoste means “fiftieth”). The Easter season is a time to let the implications of the resurrection sink in deeper, inviting us to realign our worldview and conform our living to the reality that we have been raised with Christ to new life. Easter is full of joy and the laughter of love—the grave is empty, love has won, Christ is risen! Give yourself over to the experience of that joy—take in the absolute wonder of God’s purposeful plan of salvation (from Seeking God’s Face by Philip Reinders).
- Calling -
O Lord, open our lips.
And our mouth shall proclaim Your praise.
Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever. Amen. Alleluia!
Alleluia. The Lord is risen indeed:
O come, let us adore him. Alleluia.
- Constitution -
Read/Listen, Meditate, Pray, and Contemplate on God’s Word, remembering that God is with you and ready to speak to you because he loves you.
Praying the Psalms
Psalm 7
A Shiggaion of David, which he sang to the LORD concerning the words of Cush, a Benjaminite.
[1] O LORD my God, in you do I take refuge;
save me from all my pursuers and deliver me,
[2] lest like a lion they tear my soul apart,
rending it in pieces, with none to deliver.
[3] O LORD my God, if I have done this,
if there is wrong in my hands,
[4] if I have repaid my friend with evil
or plundered my enemy without cause,
[5] let the enemy pursue my soul and overtake it,
and let him trample my life to the ground
and lay my glory in the dust. Selah
[6] Arise, O LORD, in your anger;
lift yourself up against the fury of my enemies;
awake for me; you have appointed a judgment.
[7] Let the assembly of the peoples be gathered about you;
over it return on high.
[8] The LORD judges the peoples;
judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness
and according to the integrity that is in me.
[9] Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
and may you establish the righteous—
you who test the minds and hearts,
O righteous God!
[10] My shield is with God,
who saves the upright in heart.
[11] God is a righteous judge,
and a God who feels indignation every day.
[12] If a man does not repent, God will whet his sword;
he has bent and readied his bow;
[13] he has prepared for him his deadly weapons,
making his arrows fiery shafts.
[14] Behold, the wicked man conceives evil
and is pregnant with mischief
and gives birth to lies.
[15] He makes a pit, digging it out,
and falls into the hole that he has made.
[16] His mischief returns upon his own head,
and on his own skull his violence descends.
[17] I will give to the LORD the thanks due to his righteousness,
and I will sing praise to the name of the LORD, the Most High.
Psalm 8
To the choirmaster: according to The Gittith. A Psalm of David.
[1] O LORD, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
[2] Out of the mouth of babies and infants,
you have established strength because of your foes,
to still the enemy and the avenger.
[3] When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
[4] what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
[5] Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.
[6] You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under his feet,
[7] all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
[8] the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
[9] O LORD, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Old Testament Reading
Leviticus 7
[1] “This is the law of the guilt offering. It is most holy. [2] In the place where they kill the burnt offering they shall kill the guilt offering, and its blood shall be thrown against the sides of the altar. [3] And all its fat shall be offered, the fat tail, the fat that covers the entrails, [4] the two kidneys with the fat that is on them at the loins, and the long lobe of the liver that he shall remove with the kidneys. [5] The priest shall burn them on the altar as a food offering to the LORD; it is a guilt offering. [6] Every male among the priests may eat of it. It shall be eaten in a holy place. It is most holy. [7] The guilt offering is just like the sin offering; there is one law for them. The priest who makes atonement with it shall have it. [8] And the priest who offers any man’s burnt offering shall have for himself the skin of the burnt offering that he has offered. [9] And every grain offering baked in the oven and all that is prepared on a pan or a griddle shall belong to the priest who offers it. [10] And every grain offering, mixed with oil or dry, shall be shared equally among all the sons of Aaron.
[11] “And this is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings that one may offer to the LORD. [12] If he offers it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the thanksgiving sacrifice unleavened loaves mixed with oil, unleavened wafers smeared with oil, and loaves of fine flour well mixed with oil. [13] With the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving he shall bring his offering with loaves of leavened bread. [14] And from it he shall offer one loaf from each offering, as a gift to the LORD. It shall belong to the priest who throws the blood of the peace offerings. [15] And the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving shall be eaten on the day of his offering. He shall not leave any of it until the morning. [16] But if the sacrifice of his offering is a vow offering or a freewill offering, it shall be eaten on the day that he offers his sacrifice, and on the next day what remains of it shall be eaten. [17] But what remains of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burned up with fire. [18] If any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offering is eaten on the third day, he who offers it shall not be accepted, neither shall it be credited to him. It is tainted, and he who eats of it shall bear his iniquity.
[19] “Flesh that touches any unclean thing shall not be eaten. It shall be burned up with fire. All who are clean may eat flesh, [20] but the person who eats of the flesh of the sacrifice of the LORD’s peace offerings while an uncleanness is on him, that person shall be cut off from his people. [21] And if anyone touches an unclean thing, whether human uncleanness or an unclean beast or any unclean detestable creature, and then eats some flesh from the sacrifice of the LORD’s peace offerings, that person shall be cut off from his people.”
[22] The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, [23] “Speak to the people of Israel, saying, You shall eat no fat, of ox or sheep or goat. [24] The fat of an animal that dies of itself and the fat of one that is torn by beasts may be put to any other use, but on no account shall you eat it. [25] For every person who eats of the fat of an animal of which a food offering may be made to the LORD shall be cut off from his people. [26] Moreover, you shall eat no blood whatever, whether of fowl or of animal, in any of your dwelling places. [27] Whoever eats any blood, that person shall be cut off from his people.”
[28] The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, [29] “Speak to the people of Israel, saying, Whoever offers the sacrifice of his peace offerings to the LORD shall bring his offering to the LORD from the sacrifice of his peace offerings. [30] His own hands shall bring the LORD’s food offerings. He shall bring the fat with the breast, that the breast may be waved as a wave offering before the LORD. [31] The priest shall burn the fat on the altar, but the breast shall be for Aaron and his sons. [32] And the right thigh you shall give to the priest as a contribution from the sacrifice of your peace offerings. [33] Whoever among the sons of Aaron offers the blood of the peace offerings and the fat shall have the right thigh for a portion. [34] For the breast that is waved and the thigh that is contributed I have taken from the people of Israel, out of the sacrifices of their peace offerings, and have given them to Aaron the priest and to his sons, as a perpetual due from the people of Israel. [35] This is the portion of Aaron and of his sons from the LORD’s food offerings, from the day they were presented to serve as priests of the LORD. [36] The LORD commanded this to be given them by the people of Israel, from the day that he anointed them. It is a perpetual due throughout their generations.”
[37] This is the law of the burnt offering, of the grain offering, of the sin offering, of the guilt offering, of the ordination offering, and of the peace offering, [38] which the LORD commanded Moses on Mount Sinai, on the day that he commanded the people of Israel to bring their offerings to the LORD, in the wilderness of Sinai.
- Communion -
Pray for yourself, others, our church, our neighbors, and the world.
Pray the Lord’s Prayer & the collect of the week:
Our Father who art in heaven...
Almighty and everlasting God, who in the Paschal mystery established the new covenant of reconciliation: Grant that all who have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ's Body may show forth in their lives what they profess by their faith; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
- Commission -
May the God of peace, who raised to life the great shepherd of the sheep, make us ready to do his will in every good thing, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever.
(Based on Hebrews 13:20-21)
Let us go forth in the name of Christ.