Friedens Reformed Church 

P.O. Box J, Tripp, South Dakota 57376

Church: 605-935-6758

Affiliated with: The Evangelical Association of Reformed & Congregational Christian Churches

March 29, 2020           5th Sunday in Lent

Prelude / Ringing the Church Bell / Announcements

**Opening Hymn: Hallelujah, What a Savior! 175 (R)

**Invocation: 

I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples; I will sing praises to you among the nations. For your steadfast love is as high as the heavens; your faithfulness extends to the clouds. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens. Let your glory be over all the earth.

**Call to Worship: Jonah 2:1b-9

I called to the Lord out of my distress, and he answered me; 

out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice.

You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and 

the flood surrounded me; all your waves and your billows 

passed over me.

Then I said, ‘I am driven away from your sight; how shall I look again 

upon your holy temple?

The waters closed in over me; the deep surrounded me; 

weeds were wrapped around my head

at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars 

closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the Pit,

O Lord my God.

As my life was ebbing away, I remembered the Lord; and my

prayer came to you, into your holy temple

Those who worship vain idols forsake their true loyalty.

But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you; what I 

have vowed I will pay. 

Salvation belongs to the Lord!

Reading of the Law: And God spoke all these words, saying: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. “You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

**Prayer of Confession: Almighty and most merciful God, our heavenly Father, we cast ourselves down before Thee, under a deep sense of our unworthiness and guilt. We have grievously sinned against Thee, in thought, in word, and in deed. We have come short of Thy glory. We have broken Thy commandments, and turned aside every one of us from the way of life; and in us there is no soundness nor health. Yet now, most merciful Father, hear us when we call upon Thee with penitent hearts; and for the sake of Thy Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy upon us. Pardon our sins, and grant us Thy peace. Take away our guilt. Purify us, by the inspiration of Thy Holy Spirit, from all inward uncleanness; and make us able and willing to serve Thee in newness of life to the glory of Thy holy name, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Assurance of Absolution: Hearken now unto the comforting assurance of the grace of God, promised in the Gospel to all that repent and believe: As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Unto as many of you, therefore, beloved brethren, as truly repent of your sins, and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, with full purpose of new obedience, I announce and declare, by the authority and in the name of Christ, that your sins are forgiven in heaven, according to His promise in the Gospel, through the perfect merit of Jesus Christ our Lord.

**New Testament Reading: John 11:38-44

Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”

Hymn: All Glory, Laud, and Honor 173 (R)

**The Apostles’ Creed

**The Gloria Patri 

Reading of Sermon Text: Ezekiel 37:1-14

The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me all around them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry.  He said to me, “Mortal, can these bones live?” I answered, “O Lord God, you know.” Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.”

So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.” I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude.

Then he said to me, “Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’ Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act, says the Lord.”

Children’s Sermon

Sermon: Life From the Dead

Pastoral Prayer

Lord’s Prayer

The Offertory Service:

The Gathering of Tithes and Offerings

The Offertory Hymn: All People That on Earth Do Dwell   20 (R)

**Doxology

**Prayer of Dedication

**Closing Hymn:   Immortal, Invisible     25 (R)

**Benediction

Postlude