Sunday Morning We invite you to join us for the following worship services:

Sundays
10:30 a.m. Worship service

Hand sanitizer will be available at the entrance and other locations in the church for
your use.

Washrooms will be available for use.

In the service: The service will be shown on the screen. The offering will not be gathered and presented, but there will be an offering plate at the back of the sanctuary where you can put your offering as you enter or leave. Pastor David distributes the communion wafers and an Assisting Minister distributes wine or grape juice in individual glasses.

We have coffee and fellowship time available again in Luther Hall after the service.

We will continue to evaluate our worship service procedures on a monthly basis.


St. Ansgar Lutheran Church, Outline for Worship (with sermon)

THIRD SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST, JUNE 29, 2025

St. Ansgar Lutheran Church, Outline for Worship (with sermon)
Sunday, June 29, 2025 Third Sunday after Pentecost
Based on ELW Setting Four

GATHERING

WELCOME & ANNOUNCEMENTS

BRIEF ORDER FOR CONFESSION AND FORGIVENESS
P: In the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
C: Amen.

P: Baptized into Christ, let us confess our sin.

Silence is kept for reflection.

P: Merciful God,
C: you free us to love others, but we neglect our neighbours and follow
our own way.
You lead us by the Spirit of joy and peace, but we turn away from the
abundant life you offer.
You surround us with patience, kindness, and generosity, but we grow
weary in doing what is right.
In your mercy, forgive us. Do not give up on us.
Heal us, break our bonds, and show us the path of life.
Amen.

P: You belong to Christ Jesus and you are God’s children through faith.
In the cross of ☩ Christ, and through the power of the Holy Spirit, your sins are
forgiven. Clothed with Christ, you are a new creation.
C: Amen.

ENTRANCE HYMN - God Is Here! (ELW #526)

GREETING
P: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion
of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
C: And also with you

KYRIE
A: In peace, let us pray to the Lord.
C: Lord, have mercy.

A: For the peace from above, and for our salvation, let us pray to the Lord.
C: Lord, have mercy.

A: For the peace of the whole world, for the well-being of the Church of God,
and for the unity of all, let us pray to the Lord.
C: Lord, have mercy.

A: For this holy house, and for all who offer here their worship and praise,
let us pray to the Lord.
C: Lord, have mercy.

A: Help, save, comfort, and defend us, gracious Lord.
C: Amen.

HYMN OF PRAISE (ELW p. 149)
P: This is the feast of victory for our God. Alleluia.
C: Worthy is Christ, the Lamb who was slain,
whose blood set us free to be people of God.
Power and riches and wisdom and strength,
and honour and blessing and glory are his.
This is the feast of victory for our God. Alleluia.
Sing with all the people of God
and join in the hymn of all creation:
Blessing and honour and glory and might
be to God and the Lamb forever. Amen.
This is the feast of victory for our God,
for the Lamb who was slain has begun his reign.
Alleluia. Alleluia.

PRAYER OF THE DAY
P: Let us pray.
P: Sovereign God, ruler of all hearts, you call us to obey you, and you
favour us with true freedom. Keep us faithful to the ways of your Son,
that, leaving behind all that hinders us, we may steadfastly follow
your paths, through Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Lord.
C: Amen

WORD

FIRST READING: 1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21
15 Then the LORD said to him, "Go, return on your way to the wilderness
of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram.
16 Also you shall anoint Jehu son of Nimshi as king over Israel; and you
shall anoint Elisha son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah as prophet in your place.
19 So he set out from there, and found Elisha son of Shaphat, who was plowing.
There were twelve yoke of oxen ahead of him, and he was with the twelfth.
Elijah passed by him and threw his mantle over him. 20 He left the oxen,
ran after Elijah, and said, "Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then
I will follow you." Then Elijah said to him, "Go back again; for what have
I done to you?" 21 He returned from following him, took the yoke of oxen,
and slaughtered them; using the equipment from the oxen, he boiled their flesh,
and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out and followed Elijah,
and became his servant.

A: The word of the Lord.
C: Thanks be to God.

PSALM: 16
1 Protect me, O God, for I take refuge in you;
I have said to the Lord, “You are my Lord, my good above all other.”
2 All my delight is in the godly that are in the land,
upon those who are noble among the people.
3 But those who run after other gods
shall have their troubles multiplied.
4 I will not pour out drink offerings to such gods,
never take their names upon my lips.
5 O Lord, you are my portion and my cup;
it is you who uphold my lot.
6 My boundaries enclose a pleasant land;
indeed, I have a rich inheritance.
7 I will bless the Lord who gives me counsel;
my heart teaches me night after night.
8 I have set the Lord always before me;
because God is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.
9 My heart, therefore, is glad, and my spirit rejoices;
my body also shall rest in hope.
10 For you will not abandon me to the grave,
nor let your holy one see the pit.
11 You will show me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy, and in your right hand
are pleasures forevermore.

SECOND READING: Galatians 5:1, 13-25
1 For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not
submit again to a yoke of slavery. 13 For you were called to freedom,
brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for
self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. 14 For the
whole law is summed up in a single commandment, "You shall love your
neighbour as yourself." 15 If, however, you bite and devour one another,
take care that you are not consumed by one another. 16 Live by the Spirit,
I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For what the flesh
desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to
the flesh; for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing
what you want.18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to
the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity,
licentiousness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger,
quarrels, dissensions, factions, 21 envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things
like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such
things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 By contrast, the fruit of the
Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness,
23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.
24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with
its passions and desires. 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also be
guided by the Spirit.

A: The word of the Lord.
C: Thanks be to God.

GOSPEL ACCLAMATION
C: Alleluia. Lord, to whom shall we go?
You have the words of eternal life. Alleluia.

GOSPEL
P: The Holy Gospel according to Luke 9:51-62
C: Glory to you, O Lord.

51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go
to Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they
entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; 53 but they did
not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54 When his
disciples James and John saw it, they said, "Lord, do you want us to command
fire to come down from heaven and consume them?" 55 But he turned and
rebuked them. 56 Then they went on to another village. 57 As they were
going along the road, someone said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go."
58 And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have
nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head." 59 To another
he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father."
60 But Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you,
go and proclaim the kingdom of God." 61 Another said, "I will follow you, Lord;
but let me first say farewell to those at my home." 62 Jesus said to him,
"No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the
kingdom of God."

P: The Gospel of the Lord.
C: Praise to you, O Christ.

SERMON
Bishop Carla Blakley
Bishop of the Eastern Synod of the ELCIC
Luke 9:51-62
Let us pray: May the words of my mouth, and the prayers of our hearts,
always be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our Strength, and our Redeemer.
AMEN
At a recent dinner party—and we host them often—someone leaned over their
plate and asked, "So, Carla, what’s the sermon this week?" It's a common
question. My neighbours are proud of their unofficial role as sermon consultants.
I’ve come home more than once with scribbled notes on napkins, scraps of paper,
or the back of a wine label—holy brain-storming over dessert.
This time, I told them I was working on a passage for later in June: Luke 9.
Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. He sends messengers ahead to a
Samaritan village, but the villagers refuse to welcome him. His disciples
are furious. "Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to
destroy them?"
And around that table, something happened. Every single person started
telling stories of rejection.
Stories of not being welcomed.
Stories of being shut out of a relationship.
Of losing a job.
Of being excluded at school or at work.
Of being judged for the colour of their skin, or who they love, or simply for
showing up where someone thought they didn’t belong.
And I bet you have a story too. We all do.
These are hard stories. They don’t leave us. They leave us raw. And if
we’re honest, we sometimes want the same thing the disciples wanted: fire.
God’s wrath. Cosmic payback.
I remember when I was in grade 12. I made an appointment with my
Lutheran pastor—not ELCIC—and proudly told him I wanted to be a pastor.
He laughed. Not a chuckle—a belly laugh.
His wife, who was also the church secretary, stopped the Gestetner machine
and stared. "We don’t ordain girls," he said. "What were you thinking, Carla?"
That hurt. Deeply. In that moment, if I could’ve called down fire, I might have.
Back at the dinner party, I wasn’t the only one. My friends wanted a superhero
to swoop in and set things right—to punish the people who told them,
"You don’t belong." "You are not welcome here."
But Jesus’ response in Luke is striking: He rebukes his disciples. Not just
because they’re being violent, but because they’re still thinking like the
world thinks. Their framework is vengeance and power.
His is peace and grace.
And it’s hard to make that shift.
I’ve been reading a book by Adam Grant called Think Again. It’s one of those
rare books that makes you pause. I’d read a paragraph, put it down, and sit
in silence. That’s the point of the book: to rethink. To examine not just what
we believe, but how we think.
He writes, "If knowledge is power, knowing what we don’t know is wisdom."
That line lingers.
He challenges us to question our assumptions, to embrace being wrong,
and to cultivate intellectual humility.
Not to defend our beliefs out of fear. Not to attack others to prove we’re right.
But to become learners again. Curious. Humble. Willing to be wrong.
And it struck me: this isn’t foreign to the gospel. It’s embedded in it.
Luke says, "Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem."
He knew where he was going. He knew it would cost him.
Along the way, people come forward, wanting to follow him—but they hesitate.
"Let me bury my father."
"Let me say goodbye to my family."
Reasonable requests. And Jesus replies with urgency:
"No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom
of God."
Now, Jesus isn’t saying family is bad, or that grieving is wrong.
He’s saying: there’s something bigger happening. Something that requires
us to hold our beliefs loosely, our identity lightly, and our future openly.
Because faith—real faith—is not about clinging to what we’ve always known.
It’s about being ready to rethink, again and again, in the light of love, justice,
and truth.
Jesus rebukes the disciples because they want to fit him into their
old assumptions.
But discipleship is not about having it all figured out.
It’s about confusion, discomfort, and unlearning.
And this, friends, is holy.
Doubt is not the enemy of faith.
Rigidity is.
Jesus doesn’t offer us certainty. He offers us a path. A path that asks us to grow.
To shift. To be wrong. And still be loved.
What Jesus is challenging is not just our personal comfort. He’s challenging
the social norms that decide who is in and who is out, who is worthy of love,
who gets to belong.
We live in a time when many are rethinking the church. And that’s not a crisis.
That’s an opportunity.
How to go outside the church doors and be community, to open the church
to all and welcome our neighbours.
LGBTQIA+ siblings asking: Can I be fully seen here?
Survivors of spiritual trauma asking: Can I ever trust religion again?
Young adults asking: Does this institution reflect Jesus or something
else entirely?
To follow Jesus today is to stand with those questions—not against them.
Rethinking is not betrayal. Rethinking is devotion.
Rethinking who God is in light of science, history, and experience? Holy.
Rethinking what Scripture says about women, queer people, race, and power?
Holy.
Rethinking our past complicity in systems of exclusion? Painful—but holy.
So maybe this week, instead of praying for fire, we pray for clarity.
Not the clarity of certainty—but the clarity that comes from love.
And maybe we hear Jesus again, saying not, "Be right," but "Follow me."
You may be rethinking everything right now.
Good.
Jesus walks with people on the road—not the ones who have it all figured out,
but the ones who are willing to walk, and wonder.
AMEN

Silence is kept for reflection.

HYMN OF THE DAY – Will You Come and Follow Me (ELW #798)

APOSTLES’ CREED
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s 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;
he ascended into heaven,
he is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and 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

PRAYERS OF INTERCESSION
A: Drawn into the embrace of the holy Trinity, we lift our prayers for the
wholeness of the church, the world, and all creation.
A: God of our church, send forth your Spirit as we pray for our Bishops Susan
and Carla. Empower them with your wisdom to lead the church. We also pray
for the Thames Ministry area, especially the people of Trinity Lutheran Church,
London in their time of pastoral vacancy. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Guide your church, O God. Anoint us for service and make us messengers
of your peace. Emboldened by the witness of your apostles Peter and Paul
and Christians throughout history, send us to proclaim your reign come near.
God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Protect this world, O God. Watch over fields and fruit trees, foxes and birds,
the pleasant land beneath us and the sun and moon above. Keep us mindful
of the rich inheritance you have given us in the natural world. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Counsel our leaders, O God. Make them steadfast in seeking justice and
unable to be shaken as they pursue peace. Lead them by your Spirit to listen
and respond to the people they govern. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Uphold all who suffer, O God. Give refuge to those of us who know rejection,
and shelter to those of us who have nowhere to lay our heads. Bring any who
are sick into your healing presence, especially Beth, Jean, Mary Margaret,
Kristine, Karen, Emma, Cathy, Lene, and those others who are in our hearts.
Give all your fullness of joy. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Set free this assembly, O God. Grow your Spirit’s fruits within us and within
our congregation’s ministries. Set our faces always on you, that we might live
in the freedom to which you have called us. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Merciful God, we pray for peace as war continues to rage in Ukraine and
in Israel and Gaza. Shelter all living in fear; protect those seeking refuge in
neighbouring countries; sustain families separated by the horrors of war;
tend to those who are injured; comfort all who mourn their dead.
Direct your people into the way of peace. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Embrace all your saints, O God. We thank you for the faithful departed.
Let us rejoice that you do not abandon us to the grave but lead us on the
path of life. God of grace,
C: hear our prayer.

A: Gather all our prayers in your mercy, O God, through Jesus Christ,
our Saviour.
C: Amen.

PEACE
P: The peace of Christ be with you always.
C: And also with you.

OFFERING PRAYER
A: Creator God, in your wisdom you bring forth all that is good and the
harvest is plentiful. Strengthen us at your table with these gifts of the earth
and our labour, that we may work for the good of all, through Jesus Christ,
our Saviour.
C: Amen.

LORD’S PRAYER
P: Lord, remember us in your kingdom and teach us to pray.
C: Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,
thy kingdom come, thy 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 thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,
forever and ever. Amen.

SENDING

BLESSING
P: The love of God abound in you; the grace of our Saviour Jesus Christ
fill your hearts; and the life of the Spirit ☩ bless you and give you peace.
C: Amen.

SENDING HYMN – How Great Thou Art (ELW #856)

DISMISSAL
A: Go in peace. Live by the Spirit.
C: Thanks be to God.

DISMISSAL HYMN – The Lord Now Sends Us Forth (ELW #538)
Verse 1
The Lord now sends us forth
with hands to serve and give,
to make of all the earth
a better place to live. Repeat (2X)

Verse 2
The angels are not sent
into our world of pain
to do what we were meant
to do in Jesus' name;
that falls to you and me
and all who are made free.
Help us, O Lord, we pray,
to do your will today. Repeat (2X)

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