Lectio Concordia

The Peace of Christ – Saturday

Preparing for the First Sunday after Christmas

Series: Lectio Concordia

December 28, 2024 By Rev. Mark Ryman

• Online jigsaw puzzle of today's reading • Index

• Collect: Blessed Father, out of your great love for us you sent your Son into this troubled world. Give us faith to believe in him so that we may have his peace, through the same Christ Jesus who lives with you and your Holy Spirit, forever one God. Amen

• Psalm 4:1–8

• Numbers 6:22–27

• Colossians 2:14 states that Christ erased the written record of debt and its legal demands against us. Here also there are two parts, the written record and the blotting out of that record. The handwriting is the conscience convicting and condemning us. Further, the law is the word which rebukes and condemns sins. Therefore, this voice which says, “I have sinned against the Lord,” as David says (2 Samuel 12:13), is the handwriting. Wicked and secure men do not seriously give this voice since they do not see. They do not read the sentence of the law written in the heart. This sentence is only perceived in real griefs and terrors. Therefore, the handwriting which condemns us is contrition itself. To blot out the handwriting is to erase this sentence by which it is declared that we shall be condemned, and to engrave the sentence by which we know that we have been freed from this condemnation. Faith is the new sentence, which reverses the former sentence, and gives peace and life to the heart. (Defense of the Augsburg Confession, Repentence, Scriptural Proofs)

• “When Peace Like a River” Tune

When peace like a river attendeth my way,
when sorrows like sea billows roll;
whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say,
“It is well, it is well with my soul.”

Refrain: It is well with my soul;
it is well, it is well with my soul.

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
let this blest assurance control:
that Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
and has shed his own blood for my soul. Refrain

My sin oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
my sin, not in part, but the whole,
is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more;
praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul! Refrain

O Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
the clouds be rolled back as a scroll;
the trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend;
even so, it is well with my soul. Refrain

• Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.

Memory Verse: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (John 14:27)

Memory Verse Aid: PILWY, MPIGTY. NATWGDIGTY. LNYHBT, NLTBA. (John 14:27)