Easter, 2025

Easter, 2025

Song: Holy Forever

Pastor: The Scriptures declare, and we rejoice that

“He has risen!”

All: HE HAS RISEN INDEED!

Pastor: And God’s angels rejoiced and declared that,

“He has risen!”

All: HE HAS RISEN INDEED!

Song: I Will Rise

Confession

All:

Lord, we thank you for forgiving our sins. We thank you that by your death and resurrection, we have been fully and freely forgiven. Your Word says that, “Many walk as enemies of the cross of Christ.” (Philippians 3:18) We are not enemies of Jesus or the cross, but we ask you to forgive us for the times that our lives may have looked like we were. Forgive us, whenever our words or actions have not been consistent, with our claims to love you and represent you in our daily lives. Help us to fight temptation and sin, with resurrection power. And forgive us when we have not.

 (Silent & Personal Confession)

 “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins… 19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. 20 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep… 22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”

 -1 Corinthians 15:17-22

Song: Hymn of Heaven

The Lord’s Prayer

All:

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!

Apostles Creed

 All:

 I believe in God the Father Almighty,

Maker of heaven and earth. 

And in Jesus Christ, His 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 into hell;

 The third day He rose again from the dead;

He ascended into heaven

 And sits at the right hand of

God The Father Almighty;

 From thence He will come to judge

The living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit;

 The holy Christian Church; 

 The communion of saints; 

 The forgiveness of sins;

The resurrection of the body;

 And the life everlasting. 

 Amen!

Song: Battle Belongs

“New Beginnings”

 “You can’t write Jesus off, He keeps writing.”

The Burial of Jesus

(John 19)

  “Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. 39 He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds.” 40 Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. 41 At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had ever been laid. 42 Because it was the Jewish day of Preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.”

 -John 19:38-42

“After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.”

 - Matthew 28:1-4 

NEW LIFE/BEGINNINGS/HOPE/CONFIDENCE

“All of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.”

-Romans 6:3-4

“If anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”

[Here & Now]

-2 Corinthians 5:17

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

-Romans 12:2

We are to conform to Jesus, not the other way around.

He only conformed to us by taking our human form at Christmas.

We are not fighting FOR victory

We are fighting FROM victory.

“… we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed… 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” [Isaiah 52:8] 55 “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”… [Hosea 13:14] [Because of the resurrection, death doesn’t win anymore.”] 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Always be yourself,

because an original is always more valuable than a copy.

58 Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. [Holding On] Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is NOT in vain.”

-1 Corinthians 15:51-58

“If God is FOR us, who [or What] can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?  [needed] It is God who justifies… 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died… who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who [or What] shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?... 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life… angels nor demons…the present… future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

 -Romans 8:31-39

We CAN make it!

We WILL make it!

“A time is coming and in fact has come when you will be scattered, each to your own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me. 33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

-John 16:32-33

On the other side of agony, Is Victory.

[Resurrection, New Life, New Hope]

“New Beginnings”

  “You can’t write Jesus off, He keeps writing.”

The Angel said to the women Easter morning…“He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.”

-Matthew 28:5,6

Pastor: The Bible says, and we rejoice that, “He has risen!”

 All: HE HAS RISEN INDEED!

Communion

Song: Your Name

Song: Draw Me Close

Song: Resurrection Power