Fourth Sunday of Advent, December 19, 2021
Holy Communion at 8:30 and 11am
Livestream at 8:25am
Bulletin for the service
Prayer of the Day
Stir up your power, Lord Christ, and come. With your abundant grace and might, free us from the sin that binds us, that we may receive you in joy and serve you always, for you live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Scripture
Micah 5:2-5a
Luke 1:46b-55
Hebrews 10:5-10
Luke 1:39-55
Sermon
“A Song Sung Upside Down”
Luke 1:39-55
While many people will return to larger Christmas gatherings this year, Luke invites us into a most intimate familial scene. Not even the men are invited. Young Mary visits her older relative Elizabeth, and both are carrying children of promise. John, in the dark embrace of his mother’s womb, recognizes the power and grace that has come near in Jesus. Elizabeth recognizes Mary for who she is: The Mother of God. In this intimate moment, far from prying eyes and gossipy tongues, Mary and Elizabeth see God’s future stretch out before them. It is a future so certain that Mary sees it as already accomplished. She does what the women of her faith have always done when deliverance comes near. She sings. She sings of a world in which everything wrong will be righted and the powers that be will become the powers that were. Mary sings of the upside-downing that will come when God, the same God growing in her womb, arrives in glory and peace.
Hymns
Savior of the Nations, Come, LBW 28
The Only Son from Heaven, LBW 86
The Angel Gabriel from Heaven Came, WOV 632
All Earth Is Hopeful, WOV 629
WOV, With One Voice
LBW, Lutheran Book of Worship
ELW, Evangelical Lutheran Worship
In our prayers we remember Valparaiso University.