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Sample Liturgy for the Third Sunday in Lent

On the Liturgy

Artwork for Bulletins/Slideshows

File:Angelika Kauffmann - Christus und die Samariterin am Brunnen -1796.jpeg

The Liturgy

For prelude, selections from the Lent Playlist may be played.

THE PROCESSIONAL

THE ACCLAMATION

Bless the Lord who forgives all our sins;
His mercy endures forever.

CALL TO WORSHIP

Good morning brothers and sisters, and grace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus said, “The hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him” (Jn. 4:23). This morning, we have come to seek the Lord, but only because he has first sought us. Our souls thirst for God, but God also thirsts for us—not because he needs us, but because he wants us.

OPENING PRAYER

The Kyrie Pantokrator, A Song of Penitence (Prayer of Manasseh, 1–2, 4, 6–7, 11–15) is said below.

For our opening prayer, I want to offer to God a prayer that is almost 2,000 years old, and has been passed down by generations of Christians for centuries. It’s known as the Prayer of Manasseh. Manasseh was one of the most wicked kings of Judah, and he led God’s people to do more evil than even the Gentile nations whom the Lord had destroyed. But when God punished Manasseh by allowing the Assyrians to capture him and lead him with hooks and chains to Babylon, Manasseh humbled himself greatly before God, and the Lord heard his plea. When Manasseh returned to Jerusalem, he took away the idols, he restored the altar of sacrifice, and he commanded Judah to serve the Lord. We’re told in 2 Chronicles 33:18 that Manasseh’s prayer of repentance was recorded, but unfortunately it has been lost to history. What we do have, though, is a prayer that was written a few hundred years later, and imagines what Manasseh might have said to the Lord. It’s a reminder that no matter how far we’ve fallen, God is merciful to restore us when we turn to him with a broken and contrite heart. Let us pray.

O Lord and Ruler of the hosts of heaven, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and of all their righteous offspring: You made the heavens and the earth, with all their vast array. All things quake with fear at your presence; they tremble because of your power. But your merciful promise is beyond all measure; it surpasses all that our minds can fathom. O Lord, you are full of compassion, long-suffering, and abounding in mercy. You hold back your hand; you do not punish as we deserve. In your great goodness, Lord, you have promised forgiveness to sinners, that they may repent of their sin and be saved. And now, O Lord, I bend the knee of my heart, and make my appeal, sure of your gracious goodness. I have sinned, O Lord, I have sinned, and I know my wickedness only too well. Therefore I make this prayer to you: Forgive me, Lord, forgive me. Do not let me perish in my sin, nor condemn me to the depths of the earth. For you, O Lord, are the God of those who repent, and in me you will show forth your goodness. Unworthy as I am, you will save me, in accordance with your great mercy, and I will praise you without ceasing all the days of my life. For all the powers of heaven sing your praises, and yours is the glory to ages of ages. Amen.

THE SUMMARY OF THE LAW

Over the first five weeks of Lent, Catechism Questions 13, 25, and 26 may be said every Sunday, along with two of the Ten Commandments (two per week).

Q. 13. What did God give to expose our sin and show us our need for a Savior?
God exposed our sin by giving us the moral law, which is summarized in the Ten Commandments, and requires us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, and mind, and our neighbor as ourselves.

Q. 19. What is meant by the fifth commandment, “Honor your father and your mother”?
We should honor our parents and all who are in authority, submit to their good instruction, and be patient with their shortcomings. We should not disobey their lawful commands, despise them, or disrespect them. To those who keep this commandment, God promises long life and prosperity, insofar as it shall serve for his glory and their own good.

Q. 20. What is meant by the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder”?
We should treasure and preserve God’s gift of life, pursuing peace with all people. God forbids whatever brings unjust harm to our neighbor’s life or tends toward it, such as anger, hatred, hostility, malice, revenge, murder, and abortion.

Q. 25. Have you perfectly kept all of God’s commandments, as his law and holiness requires?
I have sinned against God by doing what should never be done and leaving undone what God has commanded, falling short of his glory in my words, thoughts, and deeds.

Q. 26. What are the just consequences of our sin and rebellion?
Every sin deserves God’s wrath and curse, and makes us liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever.

THE KYRIE AND/OR TRISAGION

Lord, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.

Holy God, holy and mighty,
Holy Immortal One,
Have mercy upon us.

THE GLORIA PATRI

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

SONG

“Lord Have Mercy” is suggested as a “theme song” to be sung on every Sunday of Lent (except Palm/Passion Sunday), but an alternative is suggested below.

PRAYER BEFORE THE LESSONS

As we prepare to hear God’s Word, let us pray.

Almighty God, you know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves: Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

The First Lesson: Exodus 17:1–7

A reading from the Book of Exodus, Chapter 17, at the first verse:

17 All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the Lord, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?” 3 But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” 4 So Moses cried to the Lord, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 And the Lord said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

The Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

The Gradual: Psalm 95

Psalm 95 may be sung (see “Resources for Singing Psalm 95“) or said (below). Psalm 95 is included as a responsive reading is the hymnal Our Great Redeemer’s Praise (694, “Venite”).

95 Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
2 Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!
3 For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also.
5 The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.
6 Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!
7 For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. Today, if you hear his voice,
8 do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
9 when your fathers put me to the test and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.”
11 Therefore I swore in my wrath, “They shall not enter my rest.”

All: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

The Second Lesson: Romans 5:1–11

A reading from Paul’s Letter to the Romans, Chapter 5, at the first verse:

5 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. 6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. 11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

The Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

HYMNS

Alternatively, All My Life-Long may be sung after the sermon.

The Gospel Reading: John 4:5–42

The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Saint John, Chapter 4, at the 5th verse:

5 So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour. 7 A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.” 27 Just then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you seek?” or, “Why are you talking with her?” 28 So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” 30 They went out of the town and were coming to him. 31 Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” 32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” 33 So the disciples said to one another, “Has anyone brought him something to eat?” 34 Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. 35 Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, then comes the harvest’? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. 36 Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. 37 For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ 38 I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.” 39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.”

The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Christ.

THE SERMON

For an example sermon, see the player below.

THE CREED

Let’s confess our faith in the words of the Apostles’ Creed.

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth: And in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary: Suffered under Pontius Pilate; was crucified, died, and was buried: He descended to the dead: On the third day he rose again from the dead: He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father: From there he will come to judge the living and the dead: I believe in the Holy Spirit: the holy catholic church: the communion of saints: The forgiveness of sins: The resurrection of the body: And the life everlasting. Amen.

THE PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE

THE INVITATION

Jesus spoke to the woman at the well about the living water that he would give her. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 10 that in the wilderness, Israel drank water from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. He calls this their “spiritual drink” and likens it to how Christians drink the spiritual drink of Christ’s blood, and eat the spiritual food of Christ’s body, when we come to the Lord’s Table. The Lord’s Supper is a participation in Christ who is the Bread of Life and our Living Water. Your past may be as sinful and broken as that of the Samaritan woman, but if you have answered the call of Christ to repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins, and intend to follow him from this point forward, then the Lord invites you to take this sacrament to your comfort, and make your humble confession to Almighty God.

THE CONFESSION

Almighty God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Maker of all things, Judge of all men; we acknowledge and lament our many sins, which we have, from time to time, most grievously committed, by thought, word, and deed, against your divine majesty. We earnestly repent, and are sincerely sorry for our misdoings; the remembrance of them is grievous to us. Have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us, most merciful Father. For the sake of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, forgive us all that is past; and grant that we may ever hereafter serve and please you in newness of life, to the honor and glory of your name, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, in your great mercy you have promised forgiveness to all who turn to you with sincere repentance and true faith. Have mercy upon us; pardon and deliver us from all our sins, confirm and strengthen us in all goodness, and bring us to everlasting life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

THE COMFORTING WORDS AND THE PEACE

God speaks comforting words to all who truly turn to him. Let’s say John 3:16 together:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only [begotten] Son, that who[so]ever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Peace be with you.
And also with you.

THE OFFERTORY

THE SURSUM CORDA AND THE SANCTUS

Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up unto the Lord.
Let us give thanks unto our God.
It is fitting and right to do so.

O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty, Everlasting God, it is very fitting, right, and our bounden duty, that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto you.

Therefore with angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify your glorious name, evermore praising you, and saying,
Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Glory be to you, O Lord most high. Amen.

HYMN

THE PRAYER OF CONSECRATION

Almighty God, our heavenly Father; of your tender mercy, you gave your only Son, Jesus Christ, to suffer death upon the cross for our redemption. By once offering himself there, he made a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, offering, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.

So now, most merciful Father, we humbly ask you to bless and sanctify, with your Word and Spirit, these gifts of bread and wine; and grant that we may receive them according to the holy institution of your Son, our Savior Jesus Christ, in remembrance of his death and passion, and be partakers of his most blessed Body and Blood.

In the same night that he was betrayed, he took* bread; and when he had given thanks, he brake* it; and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take, eat; this* is my Body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me.”

Likewise after Supper he took* the Cup; and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, “Drink you all of this; for this* is my Blood of the New Testament, which is shed for you, and for many, for the remission of sins: Do this as often as you shall drink it, in remembrance of me.”

Therefore we proclaim the mystery of faith:

Christ has died;
Christ is risen;
Christ will come again.

THE LORD’S PRAYER

Let us pray.

Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be your name; your kingdom come; your will be done; on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

THE MINISTRATION

Raise the bread and the cup in the sight of the people and say,

The gifts of God for the people of God.
Thanks be to God.

The Ministers receive the Bread and Cup, and then invite the people to come forward to partake. When delivering the bread to each person, one of the following may be said:

  • The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for you.
  • The body of Christ, preserve your body and soul unto everlasting life.
  • The body of Christ; take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for you.
  • The body of Christ; feed on him in your heart by faith, with thanksgiving.
  • The body of Christ, the bread of heaven.

When delivering the cup to each person, one of the following may be said:

  • The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for you.
  • The blood of Christ, preserve your body and soul unto everlasting life.
  • The blood of Christ; drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for you, and be thankful.
  • The blood of Christ, the cup of salvation.

During the distribution, “Jesus, Strong and Kind” may be played (“Jesus said that if I thirst, I should come to him”).

THE POST COMMUNION PRAYER

O Lord, sustain us by the Sacrament that we have received, and grant that our Lenten fast may be pleasing to you, and may be for us a healing remedy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

THE BLESSING AND SENDING

Now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.

Let us go forth in the name of Christ.
Thanks be to God.

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