Pentecost
The word ‘Pentecost’ comes from the Greek meaning simply ‘fiftieth.’ Pentecost Sunday ends the season of Easter and symbolizes a new beginning. It celebrates the unleashing of the Holy Spirit on the world and the empowering of the church to reach the world with the gospel. In remembering Pentecost and living in light of this powerful turning point the church expresses gratitude to Christ for sending “another counselor” (John 14:16), celebrates the work of the Spirit in the renewal of all creation, and professes its confidence and security in knowing the Spirit’s power is available for its mission.
- 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!
Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness:
O come, let us adore him.
- 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 51
To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet went to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.
[1] Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions.
[2] Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin!
[3] For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
[4] Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
[5] Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
[6] Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
[7] Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
[8] Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
[9] Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.
[10] Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
[11] Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
[12] Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
[13] Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will return to you.
[14] Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,
O God of my salvation,
and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.
[15] O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
[16] For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;
you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.
[17] The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
[18] Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
build up the walls of Jerusalem;
[19] then will you delight in right sacrifices,
in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;
then bulls will be offered on your altar.
Psalm 52
To the choirmaster. A Maskil of David, when Doeg, the Edomite, came and told Saul, “David has come to the house of Ahimelech.”
[1] Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?
The steadfast love of God endures all the day.
[2] Your tongue plots destruction,
like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.
[3] You love evil more than good,
and lying more than speaking what is right. Selah
[4] You love all words that devour,
O deceitful tongue.
[5] But God will break you down forever;
he will snatch and tear you from your tent;
he will uproot you from the land of the living. Selah
[6] The righteous shall see and fear,
and shall laugh at him, saying,
[7] “See the man who would not make
God his refuge,
but trusted in the abundance of his riches
and sought refuge in his own destruction!”
[8] But I am like a green olive tree
in the house of God.
I trust in the steadfast love of God
forever and ever.
[9] I will thank you forever,
because you have done it.
I will wait for your name, for it is good,
in the presence of the godly.
Psalm 53
To the choirmaster: according to Mahalath. A Maskil of David.
[1] The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity;
there is none who does good.
[2] God looks down from heaven
on the children of man
to see if there are any who understand,
who seek after God.
[3] They have all fallen away;
together they have become corrupt;
there is none who does good,
not even one.
[4] Have those who work evil no knowledge,
who eat up my people as they eat bread,
and do not call upon God?
[5] There they are, in great terror,
where there is no terror!
For God scatters the bones of him who encamps against you;
you put them to shame, for God has rejected them.
[6] Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion!
When God restores the fortunes of his people,
let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad.
Old Testament Reading
Jeremiah 48
[1] Concerning Moab.
Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel:
“Woe to Nebo, for it is laid waste!
Kiriathaim is put to shame, it is taken;
the fortress is put to shame and broken down;
[2] the renown of Moab is no more.
In Heshbon they planned disaster against her:
‘Come, let us cut her off from being a nation!’
You also, O Madmen, shall be brought to silence;
the sword shall pursue you.
[3] “A voice! A cry from Horonaim,
‘Desolation and great destruction!’
[4] Moab is destroyed;
her little ones have made a cry.
[5] For at the ascent of Luhith
they go up weeping;
for at the descent of Horonaim
they have heard the distressed cry of destruction.
[6] Flee! Save yourselves!
You will be like a juniper in the desert!
[7] For, because you trusted in your works and your treasures,
you also shall be taken;
and Chemosh shall go into exile
with his priests and his officials.
[8] The destroyer shall come upon every city,
and no city shall escape;
the valley shall perish,
and the plain shall be destroyed,
as the LORD has spoken.
[9] “Give wings to Moab,
for she would fly away;
her cities shall become a desolation,
with no inhabitant in them.
[10] “Cursed is he who does the work of the LORD with slackness, and cursed is he who keeps back his sword from bloodshed.
[11] “Moab has been at ease from his youth
and has settled on his dregs;
he has not been emptied from vessel to vessel,
nor has he gone into exile;
so his taste remains in him,
and his scent is not changed.
[12] “Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I shall send to him pourers who will pour him, and empty his vessels and break his jars in pieces. [13] Then Moab shall be ashamed of Chemosh, as the house of Israel was ashamed of Bethel, their confidence.
[14] “How do you say, ‘We are heroes
and mighty men of war’?
[15] The destroyer of Moab and his cities has come up,
and the choicest of his young men have gone down to slaughter,
declares the King, whose name is the LORD of hosts.
[16] The calamity of Moab is near at hand,
and his affliction hastens swiftly.
[17] Grieve for him, all you who are around him,
and all who know his name;
say, ‘How the mighty scepter is broken,
the glorious staff.’
[18] “Come down from your glory,
and sit on the parched ground,
O inhabitant of Dibon!
For the destroyer of Moab has come up against you;
he has destroyed your strongholds.
[19] Stand by the way and watch,
O inhabitant of Aroer!
Ask him who flees and her who escapes;
say, ‘What has happened?’
[20] Moab is put to shame, for it is broken;
wail and cry!
Tell it beside the Arnon,
that Moab is laid waste.
[21] “Judgment has come upon the tableland, upon Holon, and Jahzah, and Mephaath, [22] and Dibon, and Nebo, and Beth-diblathaim, [23] and Kiriathaim, and Beth-gamul, and Beth-meon, [24] and Kerioth, and Bozrah, and all the cities of the land of Moab, far and near. [25] The horn of Moab is cut off, and his arm is broken, declares the LORD.
[26] “Make him drunk, because he magnified himself against the LORD, so that Moab shall wallow in his vomit, and he too shall be held in derision. [27] Was not Israel a derision to you? Was he found among thieves, that whenever you spoke of him you wagged your head?
[28] “Leave the cities, and dwell in the rock,
O inhabitants of Moab!
Be like the dove that nests
in the sides of the mouth of a gorge.
[29] We have heard of the pride of Moab—
he is very proud—
of his loftiness, his pride, and his arrogance,
and the haughtiness of his heart.
[30] I know his insolence, declares the LORD;
his boasts are false,
his deeds are false.
[31] Therefore I wail for Moab;
I cry out for all Moab;
for the men of Kir-hareseth I mourn.
[32] More than for Jazer I weep for you,
O vine of Sibmah!
Your branches passed over the sea,
reached to the Sea of Jazer;
on your summer fruits and your grapes
the destroyer has fallen.
[33] Gladness and joy have been taken away
from the fruitful land of Moab;
I have made the wine cease from the winepresses;
no one treads them with shouts of joy;
the shouting is not the shout of joy.
[34] “From the outcry at Heshbon even to Elealeh, as far as Jahaz they utter their voice, from Zoar to Horonaim and Eglath-shelishiyah. For the waters of Nimrim also have become desolate. [35] And I will bring to an end in Moab, declares the LORD, him who offers sacrifice in the high place and makes offerings to his god. [36] Therefore my heart moans for Moab like a flute, and my heart moans like a flute for the men of Kir-hareseth. Therefore the riches they gained have perished.
[37] “For every head is shaved and every beard cut off. On all the hands are gashes, and around the waist is sackcloth. [38] On all the housetops of Moab and in the squares there is nothing but lamentation, for I have broken Moab like a vessel for which no one cares, declares the LORD. [39] How it is broken! How they wail! How Moab has turned his back in shame! So Moab has become a derision and a horror to all that are around him.”
[40] For thus says the LORD:
“Behold, one shall fly swiftly like an eagle
and spread his wings against Moab;
[41] the cities shall be taken
and the strongholds seized.
The heart of the warriors of Moab shall be in that day
like the heart of a woman in her birth pains;
[42] Moab shall be destroyed and be no longer a people,
because he magnified himself against the LORD.
[43] Terror, pit, and snare
are before you, O inhabitant of Moab!
declares the LORD.
[44] He who flees from the terror
shall fall into the pit,
and he who climbs out of the pit
shall be caught in the snare.
For I will bring these things upon Moab,
the year of their punishment,
declares the LORD.
[45] “In the shadow of Heshbon
fugitives stop without strength,
for fire came out from Heshbon,
flame from the house of Sihon;
it has destroyed the forehead of Moab,
the crown of the sons of tumult.
[46] Woe to you, O Moab!
The people of Chemosh are undone,
for your sons have been taken captive,
and your daughters into captivity.
[47] Yet I will restore the fortunes of Moab
in the latter days, declares the LORD.”
Thus far is the judgment on Moab.
- 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 God, you have given your only Son to be for us a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life: Give us grace to receive thankfully the fruits of his redeeming work, and to follow daily in the blessed steps of his most holy life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
- Commission -
The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace.
(Numbers 6:24-26)
Go in peace to love and serve the Lord and our neighbors.