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Maundy Thursday: Poured Out
This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. Matthew 26:28
Opening Hymn Go to Dark Gethsemane LSB #436
- Go to dark Gethsemane, all who feel the tempter’s pow’r;
Your Redeemer’s conflict see, watch with him one bitter hour;
Turn not from his griefs away; learn from Jesus Christ to pray. - Follow to the judgment hall, view the Lord of life arraigned;
Oh, the wormwood and the gall! Oh, the pangs his soul sustained!
Shun not suff’ring, shame or loss, learn from him to bear the cross. - Calv’ry’s mournful mountain climb; there, adoring at his feet,
Mark that miracle of time, God’s own sacrifice complete.
“It is finished!” hear him cry; learn from Jesus Christ to die. - Early hasten to the tomb where they laid his breathless clay;
All is solitude and gloom. Who has taken him away?
Christ is ris’n! He meets our eyes. Savior, teach us so to rise.
Invocation and Litany
P In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
C Amen.
P The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me;
C I suffered distress and anguish.
P Then I called on the name of the Lord:
C “O Lord, I pray, deliver my soul!”
P Gracious is the Lord, and righteous;
C Our God is merciful.
P The Lord preserves the simple;
C When I was brought low, he saved me …
P What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me?
C I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.
Confession and Absolution
P Let us confess our sins to God and ask his forgiveness for the sake of Jesus our Lord.
C Almighty God, we have sinned against you in our thoughts, words and actions. We do not always walk in your ways and we do not love others as we should. We turn away from listening to your Word to listen the tempting voices of the world around us. We follow our own selfish desires instead of following your will. Have mercy on us and forgive us for Jesus’ sake.
P God has had mercy on us. He sent his Son to be our Savior. Jesus suffered and died for us, pouring out his blood for the forgiveness of our sins. He rose from death on the third day to give us eternal life. I announce to you that your sins are forgiven in the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
C What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.
Prayer of the Day
P Lord Jesus, on the night you were betrayed, you prayed that the cup of suffering might pass from you. But you said in prayer to your Father, “Your will be done.” You obeyed your Fa-ther’s will for the sake of our salvation. On that same night, you offered to your disciples and to us your body and blood, given and shed for the forgiveness of sins. Then you allowed yourself to be betrayed into the hands of your enemies. You were unfairly tried and con-demned to death for the sake of our salvation. As we share your holy gift or your body and blood, in communion with you, with one another and with all the saints, we proclaim your redeeming death until you return in glory. King of kings and Lord of lords, hear our prayer and receive our praise. Amen.
Hymn Lamb of God, Pure and Holy LSB #434 (v.1&2)
- Lamb of God, pure and holy, who on the cross didst suffer,
Ever patient and lowly, thyself to scorn didst offer.
All sins thou borest for us, else had despair reigned o’er us:
Have mercy on us, O Jesus! O Jesus! - Lamb of God, pure and holy, who on the cross didst suffer,
Ever patient and lowly, thyself to scorn didst offer.
All sins thou borest for us, else had despair reigned o’er us:
Thy peace be with us, O Jesus! O Jesus!
Old Testament Reading Jeremiah 31:31-34
Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fa-thers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Is-rael after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, de-clares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.
Epistle Reading1 Corinthians 11:23-26
For I received from the Lord what I also deliv-ered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as of-ten as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
Gospel Reading Matthew 26:26-30, 36-39
Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the for-giveness of sins. I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives … Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.” And taking with him Pe-ter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.” And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”
Sermon Hymn Lord Jesus Christ, We Humbly Pray LSB #623 (v. 1-3)
- Lord Jesus Christ, we humbly pray
That we may feast on you today;
Beneath these forms of bread and wine
Enrich us with your grace divine. - Give us, who share this wondrous good,
Your body broken and your blood,
The grateful peace of sins forgiv’n,
The certain joys of heirs of heav’n. - By faith your Word has made us bold
To seize the gift of love retold;
All that you are we here receive,
And all we are to you we give.
Sermon Poured Out
P “Why is this night different from all other nights?” According to Jewish tradition, that is the question asked by the youngest child during the celebration of the Passover meal. It was a different night, a night that celebrated the way God saved the people of Israel and set them free from slavery in Egypt. God sent terrible plagues against the land of Egypt, but Pharaoh stubbornly refused to free his Israelite slaves. But the time had finally come. On that night, God would pass judgment on Egypt and set his people free. On that night God would strike the firstborn of Egypt dead, from the firstborn in Pharaoh’s palace to the firstborn of the cattle in the fields. On that night, God said, he would set his people free from slavery. Each Israelite family was to kill a lamb for their meal. They were to eat unleavened bread, because they would be leaving in a hurry and would not have time to let leav-ened bread rise. Each Israelite household was to take the lamb’s blood and paint it on the doorposts and lintel of their home. When God passed through Egypt to strike the Egyptian firstborn, he would see the blood on the Israelite homes and “pass over” those homes, sparing the firstborn of Israel.
Over and over again, from that night onward, God would identify himself as the God who saved his people and set them free: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” It is the way he identified himself when he established a covenant, an agreement, with the people he saved. He reminded them that he had delivered them from the Egyp-tians and he called them now to be his holy people: “You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:4-6). God’s people were to observe the Passover every year, to remember and celebrate the God who had set them free. And so Jesus and his disciples, on Thursday of Holy Week, gath-ered in an upper room in Jerusalem to celebrate the ancient Passover festival.
Why was that night different from all other nights? On that night, and during the remaining days of that Holy Week, the meaning and promise of the Passover would be fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus, the Son of God, had also been called out of Egypt, where he had fled with his mother Mary and with Joseph to escape death at the hands of King Herod. But now his hour had come. It was time for the Son to die. This was the purpose for which he had come, and every Passover celebration had pointed ahead to this night in Jerusalem and to this single Lamb of sacrifice. Jesus gave bread to his disciples and said, “This is my body, which is for you.” He gave them the cup of wine and said, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the for-giveness of sins.” On the next day, the day we call Good Friday, the final and true Passover lamb, the perfect sacrifice, the Lamb of God, would die on the cross, his body given and his blood shed “to take away the sin of the world.”
In Jesus, God established a new covenant, not like the covenant he made with Israel, the covenant broken through rebellion and idolatry. This new covenant will never be broken because God himself has fulfilled it. It is a covenant of grace and forgiveness signed and sealed in the blood of Jesus Christ. It is the covenant in which God declares to us: “I will be their God, and they shall be my peo-ple. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
Why is this night different from all other nights? On this Thursday of Holy Week we will receive Je-sus’ body and blood in the bread and wine of his holy Supper, we remember and celebrate the new covenant in our Savior’s blood. We eat the bread that is the body of Jesus, the Lamb slain for our sins. We drink from the cup that is his blood, the blood of the covenant, the blood shed on the cross, the blood that washes away our sin. It is a sacrament of remembering and proclaiming and forget-ting. As we eat this bread and drink this cup, we remember and proclaim our Lord’s death until he comes again. And God, for the sake of Jesus our Savior, remembers our sin no more. Amen.
Hymn of Response Lord Jesus Christ, We Humbly Pray LSB #623 (v.4&5)
4. One bread, one cup, one body, we
Rejoicing in our unity,
Proclaim your love until you come
To bring your scattered loved ones home.
5. Lord Jesus Christ, we humbly pray:
O keep us steadfast till that day
When each will be your welcomed guest
In heaven’s high and holy feast.
Offering (Thank You to everyone who has donated please remember you may donate at Pathway Bank Drive-Thru window.)
Prayers Each petition ends with the following response:
P Jesus, Lamb of God,
C Have mercy on us.
+
P Lord Jesus, in this holy Supper, in the gift of your body and blood, we have forgiveness and life. Through your death and resurrection you have set us free from our slavery to sin and death. Keep us strong in faith and shield us from temptation as we follow you. Jesus, our Passover Lamb,
C Have mercy on us.
P Lord Jesus, during this Holy Week we follow in your footsteps as you take up your cross for the sake of our salvation. Lead us in true repentance and fill our hearts with the peace that only you can give, the peace that comes in knowing that our sins are forgiven, washed away in your blood. Jesus, our Passover Lamb,
C Have mercy on us.
P Lord Jesus, on this day you gave us a new command, to love one another as you loved us. Lead us to opportunities for service so that we might share with others the love, hope and comfort we have through faith in your name. Jesus, our Passover Lamb,
C Have mercy on us.
P Amen.
Lord’s Prayer
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.
Benediction
P As often as you eat this bread and drink the cup,
C You proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
P The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
C Amen.
**Lights Dimmed
Stripping of the Alter
Closing Hymn O Jesus, Blessed Lord, to Thee LSB #632
- O Jesus, blessed Lord, to thee
My heartfelt thanks forever be,
Who hast so lovingly bestowed
On me thy body and thy blood.
2 Break forth, my soul, for joy and say:
What wealth is come to me this day!
My Savior dwells within my heart:
How blessed am I! How good thou art!
By Carol Geisler. © 2020 Creative Communications for the Parish, a division of Bayard, Inc., 1564 Fencorp Dr., Fenton, MO 63026. 800-325-9414. www.creativecommunications.com. All rights reserved. Reprinted with Permission.
