Dear Fellow Members of the Body of Jesus:
During this Holy Lenten Season, we will be looking at “The Body of Jesus” as the Lent Midweek Theme at our sister congregation of Hope Lutheran Church in Countryside at their Wednesday Midweek Services. There are two ways that we can think of the Body of Jesus. One way is the manner in which I addressed you in the Salutation of this letter, “Members of the Body of Jesus.” In that case, I am referring to the Holy Christian Church as the “Body of Jesus.” That is a very biblical way of using that term. St. Paul uses the term that way in Romans 12:14, where he wrote, “So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another,” and in Ephesians 3:6: “That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body, and partakers of the His promise in Christ by the Gospel.”
The other way that we speak of “The Body of Jesus” is in reference to the actual physical flesh and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, His human body according to His human nature. This is what we will be contemplating this Holy Lenten Season. We confess that Jesus is the Immanuel, “God With Us,” that He is the very Creator of heaven and earth, come in human flesh, born of the Virgin Mary, in order to save us from our sin. This is the reality that we have just rejoiced in during Advent and Christmas Seasons.
This Lent, we will be looking at The Body of Jesus in His Holy Passion. We will contemplate the divine reality that Jesus bore all the sin of the world in His Body, so that we might be restored to God. As St. Paul wrote to St. Timothy, “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory” (1 Timothy 3:16). And as St. Peter wrote in his First Epistle, “Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).
You are invited to join your brothers and sisters at Hope Lutheran Church, 6455 Joliet Road, Countryside, for their Lenten Midweek Services. Ash Wednesday Divine Service with the Imposition of Ashes will be at 2pm on Wednesday, February 14 at Hope. The Service will be at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church at 7pm. The remaining Midweek Services will all be at Hope on Wednesdays at 1pm.
LENT MIDWEEK SERVICES at HOPE LUTHERAN CHURCH
February 21: “The Back of Jesus” (Isaiah 53:4-12, St. Mark 15:15-25)
February 28: “The Head of Jesus” (Genesis 3:1-19, St. Matthew 27:27-31)
March 6: “The Hands of Jesus” (Isaiah 49:14-23, St. Luke 23:33-46)
March 13: “The Feet of Jesus” (Isaiah 52:7-10, St. Matthew 27:33-44)
March 20: “The Side of Jesus” (Genesis 2:18-25, St. John 19:31-37)
HOLY WEEK SERVICES at GLORIA DEI LUTHERAN CHURCH
March 24: Palm Sunday (9 am)
March 28: Maundy Thursday (7 pm)
March 29: Good Friday (7pm)
March 31: The Resurrection of Our Lord/Easter Day (9 am)
My prayer is that, as you consider the Body of Jesus in His Passion bearing all of your sin, you would be drawn ever closer to Him. May our Lord grant you a Holy Lent, hearing His Word and receiving Him in His Body and Blood for your life and salvation.
In Christ,
Pastor Steven Anderson