Livestream at 8:30am
Bulletin for the service

Prayer of the Day
Holy God, creator of light and giver of goodness, your voice moves over the waters. Immerse us in your grace, and transform us by your Spirit, that we may follow after your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Scripture readings
Genesis 1:1-5
Psalm 29:1-11
Acts 19:1-7
Mark 1:4-11

Sermon
"Water and Spirit"
Mark 1:4-11; Genesis 1:1-5
Order out of chaos. Turning to the beginning of the scriptures, we find a God who brings order out of chaos, creating a world that is good. In our sin, we have brought chaos and confusion back into this world. The waters rise and the storm winds rage. Jesus Christ, the One to whom John the Baptist points, has entered this world’s chaos. He goes under the storm’s flood in his baptism, prefiguring his death, in which he undergoes all that the powers of sin, death, and the devil have to offer. But as his head breaks again the plain of the Jordan, the heavens are broken open with God’s good, re-creative pleasure. We, too, are called through the waters into newness of life. It is a new life in which we are not bound by the oppressive order of the old, but set free in the life-giving order of the Holy Spirit.

 

Hymns

 In our prayers we remember Concordia University Chicago.