What it means to be Lutheran - Week 7

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Early service. It's great to be together. Let's begin with prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for all of your gifts. Thank you for one another for this time to be together and together give our attention to you and remember your provision for us and especially through Jesus, your salvation for us. Help us to remember you throughout this study and to remember one another. We ask that you would build us up as Christ's body together in Jesus name. Amen. All right, so this is week seven of our seven week series on what it means to be Lutheran today. Oh, I got. No, it's turned on. All right. Today, what it means to be Lutheran is to be grounded. And we'll, we'll talk a lot about this, but I want to see where we've come so far in this study. So we spent two weeks on, no, three weeks on the sacraments. There's kind of a lot to talk about with that. And so we've come out with five principles, all right, for what it means to be Lutheran. And these wouldn't have to be the five that somebody chooses to teach this, but these are five that I think are really important for our context right now, the situation in which we live. I think that these are important. So first we said orthodox, and orthodox just means straight teaching, not trying to do anything crazy or different, just trying to hold to the teaching. And so we traced orthodoxy from the early church very briefly, and just said being Lutheran isn't about stepping out and doing something different or about being genius Bible scholars. I mean, yes, obviously scripture is. It's the source of our spiritual life. God works through his word, even in the sacraments, elements attached to the word. The word's important. But anyway, Lutheranism isn't about being brilliant readers of scripture all on our own. It's about finding orthodox solutions to theological problems when they arise. And orthodoxy itself is drawn from scripture. So we talked about that. We said we're confessional, and we looked at our confessions and how our confessions helped to ground us in christian teaching, going back to the early church and to the age of the apostles. Then we said that Lutherans are evangelical, we are evangelical, which is a fancy word for maybe gospel y were about the gospel. But specifically the gospel comes down from heaven. To us, the gospel is God's own self giving and self revelation. To us, anything spiritually good that we receive from God, it comes down from above. We don't generate that from below. We can't try and understand God apart from his self revelation to us, we can't try and make God happy with us, apart from the way in which he's provided for us to be right with him, which is through Jesus. So you can see that coming down from heaven in the movement of Jesus coming to us. That's exactly what that is. Who came down from heaven? It was incarnate. He became flesh for us, so he came down from heaven. Jesus Christ did. Became one of us in order to bring us spiritual goods. That's what it means to be evangelical, is to receive all good things through Jesus and faith in him, and then sacramental. We said that we were sacramental, specifically, that God works through physical means, because we are physical people. We are flesh and blood as well as spiritual. You see God forming Adam from the dust of the earth and then breathing into him the breath of life. We are earth with God's spirit, and that's how we were made to be. And so God doesn't. He doesn't just sort of stick the truth in us and we're like, whoa, you know, that's not how we. Not how we see it, not how scripture really paints the picture. You know, faith comes by hearing, hearing the word of God. And so we hear, like, vibrations of sound in the air, you know, coming in and being interpreted by our ears and by our minds. We actually have the word physically coming into us. And so we didn't really say it this way, but Lutherans actually see the word as itself sacramental, as God giving his gifts attached to physical means. And that's a wonderful thing. So when we're baptized, and then when we remember our baptism, when you touch water, when you get in the shower, when you stick your hand in a mountain, river or something like that, you can remember what God has done for you in washing you, and your body feels that, and that's the only way your body can participate in it. Luther says your body's physical, but it participates in the way that it can and receives it by faith, along with your heart. So anyway, finally, here we are. We're grounded. What do I mean by grounded? So that's what we'll spend today, figuring out. Okay, what does grounded mean? No. Well, grounded in tradition is where I'm going with this, all right? But tradition itself is kind of embodied meaning. So when I'm teaching something, I've not always been very good at providing an object lesson or something like something in front of your eyes or even just a mental picture with which you can make sense of something conceptual. So even now, I'm like, so how do I describe, you know, grounding something in reality? Right, okay. Right. So if we wanted to take teaching itself and talk about what teaching is, teaching is just an idea. It's a concept. And of course, you can think of examples, right? Like here I am right now, teaching. And so, you know, I'm. But even that is kind of hard to. It's kind of abstract that I'm speaking, something that then you should take in and hopefully, and it should change the way you think, you know? So you can use the example of a seed like Jesus does. You know, a sower went out to sow some seed, and the seed is the word of God, and the seed falls into soil, and your hearts are kind of like soil in your. In your mind, you know? And that seed, the idea, the word, if you're open to it and the soil is receptive, then that word can be implanted and grow roots and then end up bearing fruit. And all of a sudden, with this example, the idea of teaching is embodied. It's no longer just kind of a concept that you have to sort of make sense of. Now you've seen it. It's fleshed out. Hear that word? Flesh? It's embodied. That's the kind of grounded that I mean here is fleshed out, embodied in, embodying an experience. We all want this for our faith, right, and for the faith of our loved ones, that we don't just understand things about God, but that we embody them. Right? Worship in all of our traditions are a way of embodying the truth and embodying them in a way that we together form habits and embody the truth together. That's the purpose of tradition in the Church, but also tradition in any area of Life. So, for example, in the United States, we celebrate the 4 July. That's a tradition. And there's a shape to that tradition. There are a few different ways it could look, and probably infinite ways it could look, I suppose. But. But there are some main things we could point out. What are some. What are some characteristics of a 4 July celebration? Fireworks. Parades. Yeah. Picnics and barbecues. Rodeos. Red rifle. A lot more things than I thought of. Yeah, this is. This is great. Yeah. So all of those things are. Are things that bring us together. I mean, every one of those things brings us together insofar as we participate in them. So the fact that we're all watching fireworks, or a lot of us are watching fireworks around the country on the same night, it's not just that we're each individually enjoying something beautiful and surprising and amazing. It's not that we're like, you know what? Fireworks is something that every child should experience. I mean, yes. You know, maybe so it's not just like the benefit of fireworks is such that we should designate a day to watch fireworks, you know? No, it's actually, all of us going and watching the same thing at the same time is doing something far more fundamentally important for our country, which is, which is reinforcing and habituating, you know, making into a habit a national identity and pride in our country. Like, we're remembering the beginning of our country, its founding, its birth, and not just remembering. It's not just like I might have forgotten it, but we had the 4 July celebration this year, and so I remember where our country came from. You know, it's not, it's not just, like, a factual remembrance, but it's actually, it's actually that by remembering our beginnings, each of us participates in it. Does that make sense? Like, it's like marriage. Okay, fair enough. Yes, yes. But we'll save that. Okay, so it's like marriage, okay? You're like, if you get married, it's just like a one day ceremony that makes you married, right? Like, it happens on that day, and then the ceremony is over. But the ceremony, like, the benefit of the ceremony, continues insofar as you remember it. Does that make sense? So, like, every day that you remember that you're married or, like, look at your ring and remember the day that you made vows and the ring was, you know, put on your finger and such, every day that you remember, youre a your wedding day, you are participating in that day. Like, that day is still doing something for you today. It's not gone. It's still there. Does that make sense? So when we together remember the founding of our country, like, as a country, everybody, then we together are participating in that, and it's uniting us all together and sort of making us a part of the country. Baptism is like that. You're baptized into Christ on a particular day, but the benefit of that continues as you remember it. So that's how tradition works. Same with thanksgiving. Thanksgiving does something for us. It actually shapes us. There's a reason that we have a day to give thanks together. It's because we're saying together, by doing it, we're enforcing the idea of giving thanks. We're cultivating together without even really thinking about it. If we really celebrate again, it's not just about football or something like that. And if we're not all by ourselves and just sort of giving up the celebration, if we come together with family, and together actually give thanks to God. Then together, we're turning our hearts to God. And this day, which is just another day, we're just eating food. We eat food every day. We watch football, and we might be with family on any occasion, but this day, because it's been set apart and designed and because lots of people are participating in it together, it's actually creating a culture of being oriented toward God in a posture of thanks and recognizing that the things that we have are not to be taken for granted. Does that make sense? We have traditions in all areas of life, even something like going to a Broncos game and getting dressed. There's a certain kind of clothing you wear to a Broncos game, and the more you do that, the more you wear Broncos apparel, the more integrated into the Broncos fan community you are. And you feel it. I mean, like, the more you get into it, the more you benefit from it in terms of the strengthening and building of that community, and the more you go to Bronco games and participate in those rituals, or the more you gather around a tv with family and maybe even, you know, like, when you bring food to a football game, it just brings it to the next level. Right. Like, if a couple people. I don't know, do people do that here? The Broncos are kind of a tough example, right. Because it hasn't been exciting since I was a kid. That's a little bit of an exaggeration, but it's tough to have my first memories of the Broncos be, you know, back to back Super Bowls. That dates me, I guess, you know? But, yeah, so. So, anyway, when I was in college in. In Wisconsin and Virginia and I were friends, you know, not yet married, and we would go to friends houses and everybody would bring food. And, you know, the packers game was a whole. It was a ritual, you know, and there was a liturgy of watching the packers. And it's not a bad thing, necessarily. You know, it's just bad when you realize, like, wait a second, church doesn't feel like that. You know, why does it feel more real, you know, to like to be on a sports team than it does to be in church again? Like, I don't always feel that way, but. But I think some people do feel that way, that when they're on a sports team, they experience unity and purpose and excitement. They benefit from things like hierarchy. You know, they've got a coach that they're obeying, and they learn respect, and sports can do all kinds of things for somebody. Some of those things are things that church is actually designed to do. [00:16:51] Speaker B: But. [00:16:52] Speaker A: I think one of the differences is that in sports, if you don't do those things, if you don't have hierarchy, and if you don't have uniforms and cheers to celebrate your group identity, then you're going to be a really lame team, and you're not going to actually get very far or succeed at what you're wanting to do in church. We can just kind of assume, and I'm not trying to, like, drag down church either, but okay. But, like, there's also a reason that everybody, you know, so, so many people have left the church today. How did we get here? Well, people still recognize, I mean, they still. They can get into sports, right? But then when it comes to church, like, traditions and rituals and ceremonies, like, they're just, they're just doing those things just because, you know, why is the pastor wearing those things? It's weird, you know, it's like, oh, but you can wear a packers jersey, right? So, so anyway, ritual. Ritual and, and tradition and such, they take a specific shape for a reason, because they, they do something. They actually. They shape a community. They unite people together. They also orient attention. So for football, it's like we're lifting up the Broncos or whatever team it is. We're all paying attention to it, and we're also bringing our offerings of food together, you know, to celebrate. Celebration is lifting something up, right. And we're conforming to each other as part of this group. We're unified in our lifting up of the broncos. Again, it's not that, like, football is necessarily just, like, gross idolatry or something like that. It's not bad to celebrate family on thanksgiving or something like that. This is just what we do, so it's a natural part of life. And so I just say all this in order to help us not take for granted what worship is all about, which is celebrating, like, lifting something up. Ultimately, we're lifting God up. Not that he can be lifted. In that sense. He doesn't need us to lift us up, but to lift him up, but we're lifting him up in our hearts and recognizing that he is the highest good. We're looking to Jesus on the cross and putting him in front of our eyes, all of us together, and we're like, maybe we dress up. It's not that dressing up for church is like, do it or don't come thing, or you're better because you dressed up. Of course not. It's kind of like, you can go celebrate a packard's game without wearing the jersey, but why do we dress up. It's because it teaches us something and one another. It says something about what's going on. It dresses up the occasion. And so everything that we do together, that's ritualized, you know, it's not arbitrary. Or at least it didn't used to be arbitrary. All right, so that's what I mean by grounded is that you can see what people care about when you go to a Packers football watch party at somebody's house. Like, it's embodied in what they're doing. And there's more than just the packers involved. These people care about each other, and they're a community, and they're, you know, all of that is. Is embodied in practices that you can identify. And while the christian faith is embodied as well, it's embodied in practices. And so when we come together and we stand at the same time and sit at the same time, you know, somebody might think that we're like mindless sheep following a, you know, well, we are sheep. We are a flock, and we're together. We are united together. And that's why we do the same things. I'm happy to do the same thing as you guys. You do it, I'll follow you. We'll just all sync our activity together, and that'll be wonderful. And then we'll be united in a community together. There are things that. That are part of traditions that might not be readily understood. Like, why do we do that? Like, why do we. I've used this example before. Why are children to be seen and not heard? I mean, that's something that a lot of people today would take issue with because it sounds kind of demeaning to children. Don't we value children? Aren't children important? We should certainly think that as christians, there are lots of things like that. Why is that like that? Why do we. And our inclination as modern american individuals is to kind of doubt the value of things unless we understand them, at least in these kinds of areas. All right, Harold, tell us the story. [00:22:34] Speaker B: You never get too old to learn. I'm 96 years old and I've never fell out of bed, but I did last Saturday night, and. [00:22:48] Speaker A: I. Oh, Harold, can you. Can you pause and speak into the microphone? [00:22:52] Speaker B: Excuse me, Harold Moore. Oh, it's off. [00:22:58] Speaker A: Oh, it's on. It's on. [00:22:59] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah, it is. I'm 96 years old. I've never felt on a bed that I know of, and I live by myself. And I went to bed as my usual way. I didn't pray. I just got my cup. It was cold and I got under my covers, and then about 03:00 in the morning, I had to get up as usual. And so I went to get up, but I didn't get up. I fell out. And then the question was how I was going to get back up in bed and get covered up. I thought, well, I could sleep here the rest of the morning until somebody comes, or I can try getting up. And then I thought, well, maybe prayer would help. And you know what it did? I was able to get up in my breast, up into an office chair that had rollers, and I managed to roll into the living room and get into my recliner. So I was. I didn't have to call somebody at 03:00 in the morning. So you never get too old to learn, be ready. [00:24:18] Speaker A: That's wonderful. And they're the, you know, let's say the habit of prayer was a good one to have in that moment. Wonderful. Thank you, Harold. Okay, so I. Here's an ancient maxim, okay? Lex Orandi. Lex Credendi. That's Latin for the law of praying is the law of believing. Or put more simply, how we pray shapes how we believe. This is something that's been forgotten on some level or on many levels. Honestly, when the 4 July comes around, am I thinking it is my duty as a citizen of the United States to celebrate the 4 July? I'm not necessarily thinking that way. I'm thinking, okay, hopefully this is going to involve family. Yeah, we'll watch some fireworks, especially for the kids. And we'll then with kids, I'm like, well, I should teach them about, you know, 1776 and some of these things. And, you know, and then you start to realize, oh, there's a. You know, there's a reason for all these things. Or same with thanksgiving. We can take these things for granted. And I think we do in a lot of ways today. One of the influences that has led us here, I think, is lifting up the individual and sort of moving toward individualism and away from community. It's kind of that simple. In the ancient world, people saw themselves as members of a community. They didn't necessarily think of themselves as individuals, which is kind of hard to understand. A couple weeks ago, I was at the district pastors conference up in Breckenridge, and the speaker, Doctor Nafsker, had come from Concordia seminary, and he gave an illustration of this in this way. There are some professors at the seminary in St. Louis who are not, who didn't grow up in the United States or even in the west. And so there was a professor I can't think of his name. He's since been. He's gone to be with the Lord, but he grew up somewhere in the Middle east, so he's culturally, you know, very, very different from Americans. And so Doctor Nasker was telling us that for years they would pass each other in the hallway and. And this professor would say to him, how's your family? And he would say to the professor, oh, doing well. How are you? You know, and the difference is that this professor was saying, how's your family? Like, he didn't even think to say, how are you? Like, you're. Like you're an individual disconnected from everybody else. He saw Doctor Nafskar in the hallway and thought of him as a member of a group, not as an individual by himself. But he, in turn, saw this man who was really, truly part of a group and saw himself that way, probably just very firmly embedded in a family and a community. He saw him as an individual. And so he was asking him individually, how are you? And part of the conference in Breckenridge was focusing on community. When you look in scripture, you see a whole lot of community rather than individualism. And like most of the times, Paul says you in his letters, he's the you is plural. It's you all. And a lot of times when he's expressing the gospel, the gospel is that you're no longer isolated. You're now part of God's families and members one of another. You're all members of one body and united together in Jesus. But we kind of deemphasize the communal today. You can see that in the spirit of America, in breaking away from England and from the monarchy, we are made up of a lot of people who decided to kind of go make it on their own in the United States and try something different. That doesn't have to be a bad thing. But you can see it in our concept of natural rights that we are, that human beings have rights to these things. And one of those is the consent to be governed. We're part of a country and have a government because we consent to that right, not just because it's automatic. There are blessings, there are benefits to that. And then there are also drawbacks to that, kind of like with anything. That's just to say we are very much shaped by. By individualism in our culture. And so let's get back to where we started here. Lex Arandi. Lex Credendi. Right. How we pray shapes how we believe. I think that individualistic ideas kind of led to an individualistic society. Which then reinforces individualistic ideas. And we're starting to really see that individualism play out in isolation and depression and suicide in all kinds of ways. We are. Society is becoming atomized. And I mean, slogans like, you do you or I, take your pick. None others are coming to mind. The sort of democratization of truth. Like your truth. You got your truth? I've got my truth. All of this is related to individualism. Taken to an extreme, how we pray shapes how we believe. So in the context of church, you can see in the reformation from the radical reformers, a reaction against the traditions of the church. It's a pretty simple sentence. Took a lot to say, for some reason. So the radical reformers, they reacted against traditions, traditions which embody the truth. So, like rituals and arthem, okay, architecture, things like that. If you fast forward, a baptist church is going to look pretty bare, right? I think. I mean, it's not like I'm in baptist churches all the time, so correct me you know, if I'm wrong, but like a non denominational church is going to be. It's going to have a stage because it's practical. Like you need. You need the speaker to be lifted up so that everybody can see him. But otherwise it's going to be kind of like a lecture hall in some ways, right? It's going to be kind of bare. So is the liturgy, so are the clothes. It's going to be very informal. There's a reaction against formality and against embodied practices. And I think that that's partly rooted in one of the things we've talked about, one of the principles that we've talked about quite a bit in the last few weeks. So we said that the radical reformers spiritualized things. There was a focus on the spiritual so that the physical, like the water in baptism, the bread and the wine, body and blood in the Lord's supper, there was a distancing, like, let's distance ourselves from these physical things, because what really matters is the spiritual. And I think it's the same pattern as the sort of rejection of things like standing and sitting at the same time. And liturgy that feels to them like, well, constricting. I guess it constricts the spirit. But as Lutherans, we would say it actually just embodies the truth in a way that transcends my own ability to make it up on the spot best I can. Prayers don't have to come from the heart to be genuine, or we don't have to sort of make up our form of worship in order for it to be genuine. Luther didn't. He didn't reject the liturgy. So the liturgy that we have is. It's carried over from the roman rite, which goes back to the fourth century. So we didn't reject the liturgy or those practices. But I think in some ways, we have kind of followed the general protestant and modern trend of. Of letting go of formality, embracing informality, and saying, these traditions don't really matter. Our environment doesn't really matter. This is not just a protestant move. It's kind of an american western move to let go of these things. And now we're seeing it ultimately in things like the breakdown of national identity. I think somebody said. I think Justin Trudeau actually said something like, there's no such thing as canadian identity. It's like, whoa, you're gonna go that far? But Hank was just saying, we don't celebrate the 4 July anymore. Right, right, right. In a meaningful way. Right, right. We take it as an opportunity to celebrate, but I think that's. Right. That we have sort of lost some of the meaning of that. So it's not just in the area of religion, but in all of our lives. I like to talk about family structure at home, like how we spend our evenings or how we relate to one another. You know, things like children saying sir and ma'am to adults. Right. Like those kinds of things. They. We've. We've let them go and. And why, you know, maybe we need them so. Because these are. These are the structures that were, you know, how we pray shapes how we believe. So if we want. If we want to cultivate respect in our children, we like, there. There also needs to be a maybe that's confusing, that it says how we pray. How we pray. That's referring to how these values are embodied. You could say it. The way that these embodies are that these values are embodied in practice shapes the way that we actually hold these values, or our practice shapes our values. How much time do I have? What time is it? 1005. Okay. Okay. All right, so I put more in here than I'm actually gonna go over, but let me just run through lutheran worship just very briefly. The old german word for the divine service, which is what we use in the hymnal to describe the liturgy that we use on Sundays, is Goddess Dienstein, which means divine service. And you can think of that in a couple ways. This construction in English and in other languages is ambiguous. Is this the divine service because God is serving, or is it divine service in the sense that God is being served? I think it's intentionally ambiguous. Right? It's both things. But as Lutherans, we see it first. We're evangelical, so we see God as serving us, coming down from heaven in the movement of the incarnation of Jesus, in coming to us and becoming what we are in order to give us everything or his word. Giving us his word and teaching us and speaking to us. So that that word shapes us. Right? So it's God coming to us, and then. So that's what's happening in worship. [00:37:55] Speaker B: Is that German? [00:37:56] Speaker A: It's german, yes. Yes. So God is coming to us in worship through his word, through the sacraments, and that's also doing something to us. And so as we sing, we are responding. We're responding with God's word. And so we are served. And we serve, you could say God by serving our neighbor, too. As we worship, we're serving one another. As we sing, we're serving one another with God's word and. All right, so that's just. All right. Let's look at the parts of the liturgy briefly. I want to highlight briefly how each of the parts of the liturgy could be said to be shaping our life. And I think that it does this whether we recognize it or not. We don't have to be saying, like, okay, we're about to say the invocation. Okay, so just so you're ready. So that it does what, you know, what we want it to do for. You have in mind that when we say the invocation, we're saying, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and we're quoting Matthew 28 and recognizing that we're baptized into God's name and that we're here together in God's name, and that God is present here with us and that all that we're doing here is in him and that he's invited us into his life and he's brought us up into his life. We could say things like that. And maybe there are ways to do that, like what we're doing right now, or try and bring it into sermons. And we could think of other ways, too. But I think that just by saying the invocation, if we're open to it and kind of. I mean, if we're open to the liturgy, shaping us, then I think that it can shape us whether we know it is or not. But then it helps to also know what's going on and to teach it right. Confession and absolution. So we come to worship, but that entails a relationship with God where we can come to him and receive from him and such. And that's made possible only because we're forgiven in Jesus Christ. We're no longer enemies with God. We're reconciled to him by beginning every service like that with confession and absolution. It's ingraining in us that recognition that we come before God in repentance all the time. And that if we confess our sins, God, who is faithful and just, will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That happens in a moment, but it shapes our life. Kyrie Eleisone. That's greek, just straight greek. Lord have mercy. Okay, so when we say, lord, have mercy, well, that's putting us in a particular posture toward God. Okay, here we are. We've had our sins forgiven, but we're not God's equal. We're not coming to God as his pals or his buddies. We always come to him in a posture of humility, looking for him to give us what we need, not because we deserve it. You see that? That's the posture of faith and humility before God. So then we get the glory and excelsis. So the Lord have mercy is, I mean, it's humbling us, right? It's adopting a humble posture and asking God to have mercy on us. But then the glory and excelsis by saying, glory to God in the highest. I think it's kind of the other side of that. It's like we've kind of brought ourselves low by saying, lord, have mercy. And then we're lifting him up in our hearts and saying, glory to God in the highest. But then we're also celebrating what he's done for us and that he's coming to save us. So then, so the glory and excelsis, I can't think how it ends. But anyway, it's also celebratory. It's like God is high. And that's not just scary, it's a blessing, because he does have mercy and we're here to praise him. Sometimes that's called the hymn of praise. So the salutation and collect. All right, so the salutation. I say, the Lord be with you. And also with you. It's this wonderful little moment that it's like just a reminder that we're all here together and we're all here together. Hearing God's word and I don't know, it's like just this little reminder that we're not alone. I don't know, probably a better way to say that. It's wonderful. Yes. [00:43:05] Speaker C: So in other churches, lutheran churches, is this the time in other churches, is it working? Notice in other churches, I've noticed that. Is this where you would typically greet, like, your corner around. [00:43:28] Speaker A: Okay, it's coming. Sorry. Yep. Nope, you're good. [00:43:30] Speaker C: And I know we don't do that here, but, like, that. That is something that I've always looked forward to, like, when I go back home to my grandparents church. [00:43:38] Speaker A: Right. We could do that here. Yeah. So we'll talk about that in a second. All right, so there's a salutation. Lord be with you. Also with you. Let us pray. So then we. It's like we're sort of gathering. We're together, and then together we're gathering. Let us pray, and we pray. Right. Orienting ourselves toward God together. And then the collect of the day is thematic. It usually, in my view, beautifully brings together the readings and summarizes the purpose. And so, like, I don't look to the collect of the day first when I'm trying to figure out where is all this leading us, necessarily. But all the time they correspond to one another. I'm like, oh, yep, that's. And it's just a beautiful thing. Then we have readings from scripture, which all these elements have been part of the service since at least the fourth century. And really, we point back to the fourth century, because that's sort of when greater organizations started to come about. And so we can look back to those sort of organized liturgies, but those were built on what was already being done for the previous few centuries and hadn't really been as official. Okay. Readings from scripture. I mean, that goes back to the synagogue in ancient Israel that they would gather and they would hear from scripture. Like, we hear of Jesus doing this. Is it Matthew five or something like that, where Jesus is in the synagogue in Nazareth, and it's his turn to read. So he reads, and then he sits down, because that's how the teacher would do it. And then he teaches. Well, that's the. There's the sermon. Right? Okay, so then we have the creed. We talked about the creeds. Right. But this is together. We. We are. We're saying the faith in unison. That's pretty cool. I mean, that means a lot that you all would say the same thing with me. All of us together. And that faith unites us and holds us, I guess, in that confession, holds us in that confession of the truth. Prayers of the church so far through God's. Let's say. Let's just go back to the readings for a second. We hear God's word and then talk about it in the sermon. And what God does through his word is take us up into his own life. I really like that way of saying it because that's what he's doing. Like, when we embody his will, because his word and will has come to us, come into our hearts, and then conformed us to itself, like, shaped us. That's what's happening. We're being taken up into God's life. He's conforming us to his will, and so we're being taken up in his life. And then the prayers of the church, and I. You know, I'll just say, I don't know the prayers of the church. It's like taking the world up with us. I think, in a sense, if that's what you're doing when you pray, pray for a friend or when you pray for anything else, by including them, you're also, like, you're taking them up into. Into the life of God. And there's the sharing of the peace for you. Yeah. So the sharing of the peace, I think it. So, you know, for those of you who don't know what that is, it's like everybody gets up and says, peace be with you, or the peace of the Lord be with you, that kind of thing. And in some ways, it might resemble, like, some kind of. I'm just going to throw out a decade, but I don't belong to any of them. So, like, the seventies, we'll say, you know, like a. Like a seventies movement. Like, let's bring back something cool, or let's. Let's innovate. But actually, this is. This is as ancient as Christianity. I mean, the purpose of the sharing of the peace structurally in the liturgy is to say, we're all at peace with one another. We're gonna go together and receive Jesus body and blood and be united together. And like we said last week, like, that means, you are my brother or sister in Christ, and I care about your well being. And to be at odds with one another would be holding a grudge against somebody else, and to go up and participate in Jesus body and blood would be. It's a contradiction. So the sharing of the peace is this ritualized, which is fine form of reconciling with one another before we participate in Jesus and are built up as his body in this intimate way, it's actually very ancient and really important, and it was lost somewhere in the modern era and brought back through catholic liturgical reforms. I think you need to be on the podcast. [00:48:45] Speaker D: Hey, so up until 2020, I think Manda is referring to. I don't know if you were here then or not. When. When the COVID Nazis only allowed ten people in this place on any given Sunday. You know, we did do the sharing of the peace with each other. Larry will remember that. [00:49:05] Speaker A: Neat. [00:49:05] Speaker D: Everyone remembers that being in here, right? And then we went for a very long time once the congregation started coming back together where, whether you knew it or not, in between services, the elders would have to sanitize this building. We had spray bottles, remember, with some kind of a magic potion in it that would come in and kill all the COVID viruses. And so we kind of stopped doing that. But good idea. Maybe it wasn't. [00:49:29] Speaker A: Yeah, thanks for that. [00:49:31] Speaker D: We lost that. It was just during COVID that we lost. [00:49:33] Speaker A: Yeah, thanks for the history. I've never asked about our, you know, the history of our practice of that and. Yeah, I think it's wonderful and. All right, maybe we'll just start doing it. But just know it's not just, like, cool, you know, it's actually ancient and part of the liturgy. And these days we need all the community we can get. You know, we need a reminder to remember each other and reconcile with each other and love one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. So. Well, that's all, folks. We've run out of time. But thank you for your kind attention and for your love in Christ. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the blessing of nothing existing in a vacuum. We thank you for. For family, for. For parents and grandparents and ancestors, and all of all the people who came before us. Thank you especially for the church, the history of the church, for your work in the lives of your people for so many centuries. Thank you that we get to benefit from that. And thank you for feeding us through these structures, these embodiments of your truth. We ask that you would bless us as we meet together and hear your word and receive your gifts, that you would build us up and bring us close in Jesus in his name. Amen. It.