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Sunday Worship

7:30, 8:30,
& 11:00 a.m.

Education Hour:
9:45-10:45 a.m.

Office phone:
414-774-0441

 

 

Lent 2012

(Classic and modern artwork illuminates the meaning of the church season and links us to our heritage as Christians. Click on an image on this page for a larger version and more information about the artwork.)

 

Lenten Wednesdays
Feb. 29 - March 28: "We Have Seen His Glory"
10:30 a.m. Lenten Worship
(Morning Prayer Service in Sanctuary)
11:00 a.m. SAINTS gathering in the Commons
(light refreshments and conversation)
5:15-6:15 p.m. Dinner continuously served
(come when you can)
6:00-6:30 p.m. New Generation Choir
6:00-7:05 p.m. New Creation Choir
6:15-7:00 p.m. Adult Education:
"Walking By Faith"
6:15-7:00 p.m. Lenten time for families
with children up through third grade with their parent(s)
7:15-8:00 p.m. Lenten Worship

 

Lenten focus 2012 - Feb.22–March 28: “We Have Seen His Glory”
“And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory…full of grace and truth.” John 1:14 Come, travel with us and “see his glory” through “visits” to some of the places Jesus went. Experience these sacred places through video and pictures, and the words of Jesus, using “That The World May Know” by Ray Vander Laan. Our worship and study will provide a path through Sepphoris, Caesarea Philippi, Sychar, the road to Jericho, the Pool of Siloam and the Sea of Galilee. Whether you have been to Israel or not come to be inspired for what these ancient places have to teach us about life today.

Lenten Dinners Begin Wednesday, Feb. 29
During Lent, which begins on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22, Wednesdays at St. Matthew’s will present many opportunities for you to take time out of your busy week to reflect on the message of the cross. Whether you attend a choir, the Lenten family time, an adult education session, or Lenten Worship at 7:15, we invite you to begin your evening by joining your St. Matthew’s family for dinner.

Each Wednesday in Lent, from Feb. 29-March 28, dinner will be served continuously from 5:15 to 6:15 p.m.

All proceeds from the dinners will support the Re-New Orleans Mission Trip this summer. Cost of the meal is $5.00 for ages 10 and up, $3.00 for 4-10, and free for 3 and under. If you donate a food item, you will receive a free meal. Please sign up ahead of time, or call the church office.

Note: Dinner will not be served Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.

 

New for 2012: Scripture study offered on Sunday mornings during Lent
Come and join us on Sunday mornings during Lent in this scripture study of the texts for the following Wednesday. Led by Sandy Cristan these sessions will introduce you to the text for the upcoming week. The Sunday morning study and Wednesday evening studies will provide different perspectives on the same text. This is an opportunity to learn some of the richness of our texts through different voices and different perspectives. Sunday, Feb. 19-March 25, 9:45 – 10:45 a.m. in the Bridal Chapel.

 

Our Lenten Journey with Jesus
Most of us have never embarked on a journey. We take road trips, and go on hikes, and enjoy vacation travel, maybe splurge on a cruise, perhaps even join an expedition. But a journey is a lengthy ordeal, marked by the unexpected, the delightful or disastrous. In 1742, Henry Melchior Muhlenberg left his comfortable homeland in Germany and sailed to colonial Pennsylvania to minister to its Lutheran churches. That’s a journey. In the 1930s, migrants who had been forced off their drought-ravaged farms drove out to California, fueled by the myth of fruit trees ripe for picking, only to encounter yet more poverty. That’s a journey. The Israelite creed recorded in Deuteronomy 26 speaks of the beginning of the journey (slavery in Egypt) and of the end of the journey (arrival in the land of milk and honey.) Of the journey itself, the decades of woeful nomadic life, this creed says only that God helped them through. And of course Jesus had his journey, which this lent we will explore a part of in more detail.
When setting out on a journey, we may acquire a guidebook to assist with the planning. We want to know what are the sights and experiences not to be missed? It can be valuable to gain such perspectives so that we don’t, out of ignorance, needlessly repeat others’ mistakes. The best guidebooks pique the imagination and tantalize with possibilities. Our guidebook: the Bible.

Our Lenten journey is an annual pilgrimage in the springtime in which we encounter once more, as church, the saving, life-giving mercy of the triune God. We might speak of the time from Ash Wednesday through Easter Day as a “Lenten journey” moving through the forty days (Lent) to the great Three Days, and then on to the fifty days of rejoicing (Easter). And we take this journey in the company of others, formed to be a body: living, moving, breathing, and walking through the world.

This journey from death to life is no joke. It can be long and arduous. Such a journey will change your life, and not just your individual life, but your communal, shared life in God. Make this Lenten time a true Journey, using your bible, as a road map for your life journey.
--John Paradowski, Minister of Music

 

The Season of Lent

As early as the mid-fourth century, Christians have observed a time of preparation before the Easter celebration. The Lenten season begins on Ash Wednesday and lasts for 40 days. The forty days of Lent recall the 40 day fast of Jesus in the wilderness after his baptism (Matthew 4:2, Luke 4:1-2) and Moses' 40 day fast on Mount Sinai (Exodus 34:28). It is a time of simplicity and preparation.

Principal Themes

Color of the Season: Purple, suggesting somberness and solemnity.

[The following article and links are from Ken Collins, a UCC pastor who has written extensively on religious life and practices. His website on Lent is [here].

Lent is a season of soul-searching and repentance. It is a season for reflection and taking stock. Lent originated in the very earliest days of the Church as a preparatory time for Easter, when the faithful rededicated themselves and when converts were instructed in the faith and prepared for baptism. By observing the forty days of Lent, the individual Christian imitates Jesus’ withdrawal into the wilderness for forty days. All churches that have a continuous history extending before AD 1500 observe Lent. The ancient church that wrote, collected, canonized, and propagated the New Testament also observed Lent, believing it to be a commandment from the apostles. (See The Apostolic Constitutions, Book V, Section III.)

You can read about fasting [here], which is a spiritual discipline that does not involve starvation or dehydration. See [here] for one explanation of what we accomplish by observing Lent.

You can read about Lenten fasting during medieval times [here]. The link even includes a very interesting recipe!

The Western Church

Because Sunday is the day of the Resurrection, we skip over Sundays when we calculate the length of Lent. Therefore, in the Western Church, Lent always begins on Ash Wednesday, the seventh Wednesday before Easter [more].

In many countries, the last day before Lent (called Mardi Gras, Shrove Tuesday, Carnival, or Fasching) has become a last fling before the solemnity of Lent. For centuries, it was customary to fast by abstaining from meat during Lent, which is why some people call the festival Carnival, which is Latin for farewell to meat.

 

The Eastern Church

The Eastern Church does not skip over Sundays when calculating the length of the Great Lent. Therefore, the Great Lent always begins on Clean Monday, the seventh Monday before Easter, and ends on the Friday before Palm Sunday—using of course the eastern date for Easter. The Lenten fast is relaxed on the weekends in honor of the Sabbath (Saturday) and the Resurrection (Sunday). The Great Lent is followed by Lazarus Saturday and Palm Sunday, which are feast days, then the Lenten fast resumes on Monday of Holy Week. Technically, in the Eastern Church, Holy Week is a separate season from the Great Lent.

Special Days

The purpose of the liturgical calendar is to relive the major events in Jesus’ life in real time, which is why Lent is forty days long. If Jesus were born on 25 December, then His conception—thus also His incarnation—would have been nine months earlier, on about 25 March. That is when the angel Gabriel would have announced Jesus’ birth to Mary. Thus 25 March is known in the historic church as The Annunciation.

Roughly speaking, the western Church consists of Protestants, Catholics, and Anglicans. The eastern Church consists of the Eastern Orthodox churches, the Oriental Orthodox churches, and the eastern-rite churches affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church.

 

Why Do We Use Ashes on Ash Wednesday?

Ash Wednesday is the Wednesday of the seventh week before Easter and the first day of Lent. The day is named for the practice of imposing ashes, a practice which many Lutheran congregations have found to be a very meaningful part of the Ash Wednesday liturgy.

Using ashes as a sign of repentance is an ancient practice, often mentioned in the Bible (e.g., Jonah 3:5-9; Job 42:6; Jeremiah 6:26; Matthew 11:21). The early Christians adopted the use of ashes from Jewish practice as an external mark of penitence.

Ashes symbolize several aspects of our human existence:

In the liturgy the confession and imposition serve as the gathering rite for the Ash Wednesday service of Holy Communion. This confession marks the beginning of a season of penitence. The Maundy Thursday absolution is the structural response to the Ash Wednesday confession, marking off Lent as a penitential time. At the conclusion of the Ash Wednesday confession and imposition of ashes, a declaration of grace is used, coupled with a plea for mercy.
--John Paradowski, Minister of Music

Lessons and Readings for Lent 2012

Ash Wednesday - February 22
Holy Communion: 10:30 a.m. & 7:15 p.m.
(Healing Prayer Liturgy follows each service)

Prayer of the Day
Almighty and ever-living God, you hate nothing you have made, and you forgive the sins of all who are penitent. Create in us new and honest hearts, so that, truly repenting of our sins, we may receive from you, the God of all mercy, full pardon and forgiveness through your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
or
Gracious God, out of your love and mercy you breathed into dust the breath of life, creating us to serve you and our neighbors. Call forth our prayers and acts of kindness, and strengthen us to face our mortality with confidence in the mercy of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

 

First Sunday in Lent - Feb. 26, 2012
Sunday Worship: 7:30 & 11:00 a.m. - Holy Communion: 8:30 a.m.

Prayer of the Day
Holy God, heavenly Father, in the waters of the flood you saved the chosen, and in the wilderness of temptation you protected your Son from sin. Renew us in the gift of baptism. May your holy angels be with us, that the wicked foe may have no power over us, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

 

Second Sunday in Lent - March 4, 2012
Holy Communion: 7:30, 8:30 & 11:00 a.m.

Prayer of the Day
O God, by the passion of your blessed Son you made an instrument of shameful death to be for us the means of life. Grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ that we may gladly suffer shame and loss for the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.


Third Sunday in Lent - March 11, 2012
Holy Communion: 7:30 a.m. - Sunday Worship: 8:30 & 11:00 a.m.

Prayer of the Day
Holy God, through your Son you have called us to live faithfully and act courageously. Keep us steadfast in your covenant of grace, and teach us the wisdom that comes only through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

 

Fourth Sunday in Lent - March 18, 2012
Sunday Worship: 7:30 & 8:30 a.m. - Holy Communion: 11:00 a.m.

Prayer of the Day
O God, rich in mercy, by the humiliation of your Son you lifted up this fallen world and rescued us from the hopelessness of death. Lead us into your light, that all our deeds may reflect your love, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

 

Fifth Sunday in Lent - March 25, 2012
Sunday Worship: 7:30 & 11:00 a.m. - Holy Communion: 8:30 a.m.

Prayer of the Day
O God, with steadfast love you draw us to yourself, and in mercy you receive our prayers. Strengthen us to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, that through life and death we may live in your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.


Lent: Ready for a Spiritual Evaluation?

Sister Joan Chittister has said that “souls die from lack of reflection.” Lent is a good time for 40 days of reflection, 40 days of spiritual evaluation — an annual check-up, as it were. Lent is about looking into the mirror. Not the mirror above the bathroom sink, and not the big mirrored doors in a hotel room, or the store window as you walk by. It’s not even the 360-degree mirror made famous by the TV show “What Not to Wear.” The mirror of Lent creates reflections even larger than that. To ask questions about how we give, how we pray, and how we care for our neighbor is to hold a metaphorical mirror up to our souls. It is to lay open and bare before God our very lives, including all the things we hide from others and even that which we try to hide from ourselves.

One of the ways we enter into this soul-searching reflection is in the extended confession of sins in the Ash Wednesday liturgy that begins the Lenten period.

 

Information about Lenten Wednesdays [here]

Lenten schedule to download or print [here]

Additional Lenten Resources [here]