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The Advent-ure Of Peace

Worship
Zephaniah 3:14-20
Philippians 4:4-7
Luke 3:7-18
Third Sunday of Advent - C
Dallas A. Brauninger
Lectionary Worship Aids
Series V, Cycle C
First Lesson: Zephaniah 3:14-20
Theme: The Advent-ure Of Peace

Call To Worship
Leader: All of us meet troublesome relationships.

People: We come yearning for solutions.

Leader: We know about arguing with ourselves and disagreeing with others.

People: We come wanting to resolve and settle.

All: Come, Christ, we await your peace.

Collect

Peace-giving God, who promises to lead us toward agreement and who calls us home to our true selves, renew within us a sense of your enduring peace. Amen.

Prayer Of Confession

God who removes disaster from us, God who turns away enemies of fear and turmoil, God who rejoices over us with gladness, renew us with the lasting peace of your love. In the name of Christ. Amen.

03C Hymns
"[O][Oh] Come, O Come, Emmanuel" Tune: VENI EMMANUEL

"My Heart Sings Out With Joyful Praise" Tune: MARIAS LOVS NG

"People In Darkness Are Looking For Light" (vv. 1-3) Tune: ADVENT1

* * *

Second Lesson: Philippians 4:4-7
Theme: Amazing Peace

Call To Worship

Rejoice in God for God is near. Let us rejoice in God by unfolding our souls. Let us rejoice by sharing ourselves with God and with those around us. And we will know a peace that we had not expected. Come, let us worship God.

Collect

We come to you, O God, with hearts thankful for your generous
spirit. Hear our songs and prayers of thanksgiving because you are near to show us the way of peace. Amen.

Prayer Of Confession

Dear God, we want to move beyond protecting our gentleness so much that we become closed in upon ourselves. We equate gentleness with exposing our vulnerability. We forget that tenderness also uncovers strength. Help us to glimpse the peace that can come from compassion. In Jesus' name. Amen.

03C Hymns
"Mary And Joseph In Bethlehem Town" Tune: SABRA

"Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" Tune: MENDELSSOHN

"Gentle Mary Laid Her Child" Tune: TEMPUS ADEST FLORIDUM

* * *


Gospel: Luke 3:7-18
Theme: God Is Able

Call To Worship
Leader: God is able,

People: And so are we.

Leader: God is able to do what seems impossible.

People: We are able to bear amazing fruit from our resources.

Leader: Come, let us worship our able, empowering God.

Collect

God, who offers us a reason to change our ways and who invites us to discover that we, too, are able to be kind, to share, and to choose fair ways, to you we return thanks. Amen.

Prayer Of Confession

When we live out the faith of our baptism, O God, we begin to understand our responsibility for how we live. Strengthen our resolve to act beyond self-interest. Open our ears to hear that we are able to live as you would have us live. In the name of the coming Savior. Amen.

03C Hymns
"Awake! Awake, And Greet The New Morn" Tune: REJOICE, REJOICE

"[On River Jordan's Bank][On Jordan's Bank][The Baptist Shouts][On Jordan's Shore]" Tune: WINCHESTER NEW

"Healing River Of The Spirit" Tune: JOEL or BEACH SPRING

____________

1. Sing verses 1, 2, and 3 of this Advent Hymn on Advent 3. Sing verse 3 as a closing response after the benediction.
UPCOMING WEEKS
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The Immediate Word

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For November 30, 2025:
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Deuteronomy 26:1-11
According to Martin Luther our thanksgiving is brought about only by justification by grace:

But bringing of tithes denotes that we are wholly given to the service of the neighbor through love…  This, however, does not happen unless, being first justified by faith. (Luther’s Works, Vol.9, p.255)

The Reformer also wants us to be happy, what with all the generous gifts we have been given.  He wrote:
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A schoolteacher asked her students to make a list of the things for which they were thankful. Right at the top of Chad’s list was the word “glasses.” Some children resent having to wear glasses, but evidently not Chad! She asked him about it. Why was he thankful that he wore glasses?

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The philosopher Eric Hoffer says, “The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings!” That’s true, isn’t it?
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Christianity is, among other things, an intellectual quest. The curriculum to know God truly. The lesson plans interact creatively with other aspects of faith: worship is vain if not grounded in truth, while service is misguided if based on faulty premises. While faith certainly cannot be reduced to knowledge, it cannot be divorced from it, either.

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John E. Sumwalt
The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. (v. 6)

We just received word about the passing of our friend, Rosmarie Trapp. We had lost touch with her in recent years, so I was shocked when I stumbled onto her obituary in The New York Times from May 18, 2022.
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Contents
What's Up This Week
"The Reason for the Season" by David Leininger
"Time's Up" by John Jamison


What's Up This Week

CSSPlus

John Jamison
Object: The activity for this message is the Be Thank You! game.

* * *

The Village Shepherd

Janice B. Scott
Rosemary was 33 years old. She'd been married to James for four years and they had two children, Sam who was two and the baby, Elizabeth, who was just three weeks old. Apart from the baby blues and extreme fatigue, both of which got her down a bit when James was at work, Rosemary was happy. They had recently moved to the London suburbs and James commuted each day by train.

SermonStudio

Carlos Wilton
This brief psalm is among the most familiar in the psalter, but that is primarily because its verses have been excerpted in so many hymns and liturgical texts. There is something to be gained from looking at Psalm 100 in its entirety, and trying to recover its ancient liturgical context.

James Evans
"Pray for the peace of Jerusalem" (v. 6). What better way could there be for us to begin the Advent season than by focusing our prayers on peace? The word, shalom, translated "peace," means much more than the mere absence of conflict. And of course, it is not only Jerusalem that is in need of peace; the whole world needs the shalom that the psalmist dreams about. So perhaps we should expand the breadth of this prayer, and deepen it with our awareness of the various meanings of the Hebrew idea of peace.

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Lesson 1: Isaiah 2:1--5 (C, RC, E)
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A popular skit at church camps involves about a dozen folks lined up side-by-side, looking anxious and frustrated facing the audience. Each person rests a left elbow on the right shoulder of their neighbor. Then, from left to right, each member asks, "Is it time yet?" When the question arrives at the end of the line, the last person looks at his/her wristwatch and responds, "No." This reply is passed, one-by-one each with bored sighs, back to the first questioner. After a few moments, the same question is passed down the line (left elbows remaining on the right shoulders).
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I used to be against prayer in public schools.
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Thanksgiving, according to one newspaper columnist, has kept its original meaning better than any other holiday. That original meaning, he wrote, was family reunions around large dinner tables.

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Thanksgiving: How do we say thanks authentically and not lapse into the platitudes so often associated with this holiday? There are several dangers associated with the holiday. Ever since it was instituted as a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln, and even before when various state governors instituted it in their states, Thanksgiving has not been a strictly Christian holiday. There has been a lot of nationalism and self-congratulations associated with this day. What is the distinctively Christian way to give thanks to God for all the good things that we have?

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