Sermon Information
This Week’s Sermon Title: Preparing Properly
Preacher: The Rev. Ben Hughes
Dates: Nov. 27-28
This week’s bulletins
The collect of the day
Almighty and everlasting God, whose will it is to restore all things in your well-beloved Son, the King of kings and Lord of lords: Mercifully grant that the peoples of the earth, divided and enslaved by sin, may be freed and brought together under his most gracious rule; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
The Lesson: Isaiah 40: 3-5
3 A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5 And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
The psalm: Psalm 126
1 When the Lord overturned the captivity of Zion,
then were we like those who dream.
2 Then was our mouth filled with laughter
and our tongue with shouts of joy.
3 Then they said among the nations,
“The Lord has done great things for them.”
4 Indeed, the Lord has done great things for us already,
whereof we rejoice.
5 Overturn our captivity, O Lord,
as when streams refresh the deserts of the south.
6 Those who sow in tears
shall reap with songs of joy.
7 He who goes on his way weeping and bears good seed
shall doubtless come again
(BCP 2019)
The gospel: luke 3: 1-6
John the Baptist Prepares the Way
3 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, 2 during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness. 3 And he went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 4 As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet,
“The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.
5 Every valley shall be filled,
and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
and the crooked shall become straight,
and the rough places shall become level ways,
6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”
