A Congregation at Prayer ~ January 9-15, 2017 ~ The Lord's Prayer – Seventh Petition and Doxology1/9/2017 Catechesis Notes for the Week—The Seventh Petition--“Rescue us from every evil of body and soul, possessions and reputation.” When we pray the Seventh Petition, “but deliver us from evil,” we might be tempted to conclude that we are asking that “evil” never rear its head in our lives. This misses the mark. Evil will come into our lives in the form of Satan’s attacks upon our “body and soul, possessions and reputation.” Holy Scripture makes this clear. We will not be spared from being attacked. God wills that the attacks of evil against us serve the cause of faith. “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you and you shall glorify Me.” Therefore, in the Seventh Petition we are asking that God would preserve our faith in Christ when we are assaulted by the Evil One, and teach us to commend ourselves—body, soul, and spirit, with all that we are and have —into His gracious keeping. The Word of our Lord teaches us that He will not forsake His own. If He allows evil to enter into our lives, then He does so for His good purposes and for the exercise of faith in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. This petition promises the Christian: “God will not allow the Evil One or any adversity to overwhelm you.” By this petition He invites you to trust this promise and to call upon Him in your need. In this way faith in Christ is active. 
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A Congregation at Prayer ~ January 2-8, 2017 ~ The Lord's Prayer – The Fifth and Sixth Petitions1/2/2017 Catechesis Notes for the Week—The Fifth and Sixth Petitions—Faith in Christ’s Righteousness Brings True Freedom--Faith in Christ’s righteousness, which is a free gift of God’s grace that covers all our sin, gives true freedom. It is by the gift of Christ’s righteousness that we learn to commend our fellow sinners to God, not holding their sins against them but sincerely forgiving them and gladly doing good to them, especially when they sin against us (Fifth Petition). It is by the gift of Christ’s righteousness that we are delivered from every evil (Sixth Petition). This is why faith continues to pray that God would preserve us in His forgiveness against all evil. Satan’s desire is to tempt us away from the free gift of the righteousness of Christ. When our faith moves away from Christ’s righteousness then false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice come into our hearts and lives. So the faith that receives Christ’s righteousness is always calling upon Him in prayer to preserve us in the freedom of His righteousness.
Catechesis Notes for the Week—Joseph, the Guardian of Jesus, and Christian Vocation (Read Matthew 1:18-25)--Joseph, the Guardian of Jesus as he is often called, had a difficult vocation. He was called to be Mary’s husband and Jesus’ earthly father. This calling meant a life of suffering and self-denial. This is always what true faith calls us to: a life of sacrificial love in which we deny ourselves. This is the shape of our lives as Christians because our life is lived by faith in the God and Savior who lived in selfless love for us. The Child conceived in Mary’s womb was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. Mary was not an adulteress. His name would be called “Jesus” because He is the Lord who would save His people from their sins by becoming one with them in their flesh and blood. All this was done to fulfill the Scriptures, “Behold, a virgin shall be with child and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel.” This means that God is with us in the poverty and humiliation of our human condition in order to redeem us by the sacrifice of Himself. Joseph had no strength to fulfill his vocation within himself, but he was strengthened by the Holy Spirit through the promises of the Scriptures and the message of God’s selfless love for him and for all his people. This is our strength too in our vocation. The Gospel not only saves us from our sins, but it also strengthens and keeps us in the love of Christ in the earthly vocations to which our Lord has called us.
A Congregation at Prayer ~ December 5-11, 2016 ~ The Lord's Prayer – Second & Third Petitions12/5/2016 Catechesis Notes for the Week—Repentance Is at the Heart of Advent--“I’m tired of hearing talk about our sin!” This is often the response of those who hear the call to repentance. “Sin is a downer! Can’t we get on with something else?” Yes, we can go on. That’s what repentance is all about—going on, confessing sin, turning from it to Christ, finding our relief, comfort, and strength in His forgiveness. The message of repentance is not only the knowledge of our sin, it is also the proclamation that there is nothing that Jesus hasn’t done to save you from your sin and to give you new life and freedom now! The message of repentance always brings relief when it finds its rest in Christ, our righteousness.
Catechesis Notes for the Week—Advent--Advent means “coming.” It is the beginning of the Church Year. "Here in late November, we are in the middle of a season of dying. The flowers are frozen. The gardens are all gone. Gone are the greens and blues of summer. Here to stay are the grey days and long nights of winter. Yet in the middle of nature’s dying, we experience a Church that is thriving! In the Church’s year, all is fresh and new as we await the birth of the Word made flesh. In nature, we see more darkness than daylight. But in the Church, we watch with wide-open eyes as the Light of the World dawns in the darkness. In nature, we come face to face with the stubborn fact that all things pass away. But in the Church, we celebrate the coming of Christ who makes all things new!"
A Congregation at Prayer ~ November 21-27, 2016 ~ The Lord's Prayer – Address & First Petition11/20/2016 Catechesis Notes for the Week--The End of the Church Year: Watching During the Great Tribulation--The Bride of Christ,the Holy Christian Church, waits eagerly for her Lord’s Second Coming. Then she, of whom we are all members, will be delivered once and for all from sin and the corruption that is in the world. The “Great Tribulation” of the last days is the struggle that the Church and every Christian in every age has had with the devil, the world, and the sinful flesh. These enemies attack faith in Christ. We, Christ’s Church, have been in the “Last Days” since our Lord's ascension into heaven. The faith of the Church has always been under attack. Our only defense as Christians is the Word of God and the prayer of faith that claims Christ's victory in the midst of this suffering.
CATECHESIS NOTES FOR THE WEEK— The Seventh Petition and Doxology--“Rescue us from every evil of body and soul, possessions and reputation.” When we pray the Seventh Petition, “but deliver us from evil,” we might be tempted to conclude that we are asking that “evil” never rear its head in our lives. This misses the mark. Evil will come into our lives in the form of Satan’s attacks upon our “body and soul, possessions and reputation.” Holy Scripture makes this clear. We will not be spared from being attacked. God wills that the attacks of evil against us serve the cause of faith. “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will answer you and you shall glorify Me.” Therefore, in the Seventh Petition we are asking that God would preserve our faith in Christ when we are assaulted by the Evil One, and teach us to commend ourselves—body, soul, and spirit, with all that we are and have—into His gracious keeping. The Word of our Lord teaches us that He will not forsake His own. If He allows evil to enter into our lives, then He does so for His good purposes and for the exercise of faith in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. This petition promises the Christian: “God will not allow the Evil One or any adversity to overwhelm you.” By this petition He invites you to trust this promise and to call upon Him in your need. In this way faith in Christ is active. The Verse for the week promises us that the Holy Spirit will also pray for us when we are weak and under the assaults of the Evil One. This is good news, indeed, and very comforting when evil comes upon us.
CATECHESIS NOTES FOR THE WEEK— The Fifth and Sixth Petitions--Faith in Christ’s Righteousness Brings True Freedom — Faith in Christ’s righteousness, which is a free gift of God’s grace that covers all our sin, gives true freedom. It is by the gift of Christ’s righteousness that we learn to commend our fellow sinners to God, not holding their sins against them but sincerely forgiving them and gladly doing good to them, especially when they sin against us (Fifth Petition). It is by the gift of Christ’s righteousness that we are delivered from every evil (Sixth Petition). This is why faith continues to pray that God would preserve us in His forgiveness against all evil. Satan’s desire is to tempt us away from the free gift of the righteousness of Christ. When our faith moves away from Christ’s righteousness then false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice come into our hearts and lives. So the faith that receives Christ’s righteousness is always calling upon Him in prayer to preserve us in the freedom of His righteousness.
CATECHESIS NOTES FOR THE WEEK–The Fourth Petition–We cry out to God for mercy and pray for the strength to live in hope for His Second Coming. He will set us free from our sin, once and for all. He will free us from the corruption of this present age and bring forth the eternal kingdom of His salvation. We, as penitent sinners, cry “Hosanna to the Son of David! Save us now Lord! You are our King and Deliverer. Rescue us from the threatening perils of our sin and save us by Your mighty deliverance!” The Lord hears and answers our prayers. He teaches us to carry the cross of affliction and to live in the blessed hope of His coming. He answers our prayers according to His Word so that we might live confidently and joyfully, even as we struggle against the weaknesses of the flesh in a fallen world. It is because of the promise of God’s grace and mercy to us in Christ that we have every reason to “rejoice in the Lord always.” Casting every care upon Him with faith in the Savior to hear, answer, uphold, and strengthen us, we live confidently and are guarded and kept in the true faith by our faithful Lord who comes to us, even now, in His precious Gospel and life-giving sacraments.
CATECHESIS NOTES FOR THE WEEK -- The Fruit of Repentance --The fruit of repentance is sometimes called “the fruit of the Spirit.” Paul identifies the fruit of the Spirit as “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5:22). Such fruit is produced by the Spirit of God through the Gospel of Jesus Christ that is received and believed. Such fruit is manifest in concrete ways in the vocations to which we are called. When we experience the absence of such fruit in our lives, this becomes the occasion to humbly confess our sin and receive our Lord’s absolution. We always need the absolution. There is never a time in which we won’t need the absolution, because the absolution is the word of forgiveness by which the Holy Spirit works in our lives. The strength to confess, the strength to live, the repentant life, and the fruits of the Spirit are all produced in us by the ministry of Christ’s forgiveness. “Faith …is a divine work in us that changes us and makes us to be born anew of God … It kills the old Adam and makes us altogether different men, in heart and spirit and mind and powers; it brings with it the Holy Spirit. O, it is a living, busy, active, mighty thing, this faith. It is impossible for it not to be doing good works incessantly. It does not ask whether good works are to be done, but before the question is asked, it has already done them, and is constantly doing them” (Martin Luther). Faith produces such powerful gifts in us by the Spirit and absolution of Christ. 
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