Worship Resources for
the Center for Faith and Giving
First Sunday of Lent
Lent includes 40 days, beginning with Ash Wednesday (February 22, 2023) and concluding with the Saturday before Easter (April 8, 2023). The 40 days do not include Sundays (thus the “First Sunday of Lent” and not “First Sunday in Lent”). The season offers opportunities for Christians to strengthen our spiritual lives, consider how to go deeper and how to acknowledge our awareness of the ways we fall short in our efforts to follow Jesus.
Call to Worship (one voice, inspired by Ps. 32)
As we come to worship God on this first Sunday of Lent, let’s begin with words
adapted from Psalm 32:
Our God will be a hiding place for us!
Knowing God forgives our sin,
together, let us give thanks for the ways
we’re surrounded by the Holy One!
With one voice, let all who are upright in heart shout for joy,
for God will instruct and teach us
to live out our identity as followers of Jesus.
Opening Prayer
God of Grace, as we begin this Lenten season, thank you for the ways you surround and sustain us, even when we turn our backs to you. Help us repent – turning once more to fill our hearts, minds and spirits with you. Teach us once more to keep our eyes focused on you as we travel this 40 day journey of prayer, repentance and sharing our financial resources with those who are in need. AMEN
Invitation to Offering
In Matthew’s account of Jesus’ 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness, Satan appears to Jesus, asking him to turn his back on God. Instead, Jesus offers scriptural responses to each of the three temptations, rejecting what Satan held out to the famished and exhausted Jesus.
This 40 day season of Lent gives us time to get clear about we can offer from our own lives (whether we’re famished and exhausted, simply plugging along, or filled with energy and enthusiasm).
For some, Lent is a time to “give up”. For others, these 40 days provide enough time to form a new habit, “taking on” the traditional 3-prong prayer, repentance and alms-giving.
Is there some outreach or mission effort you might support with a weekly gift for these next 6 Sundays? Do you want to support a particular ministry of this congregation (name a specific one, if you can)? Are you eager to join with others in a new church-wide response to a need you can identify?
This first Sunday of this season is a great time to launch our own Lenten discipline of giving. Consider what you might do, and make a start today!
Prayer of Thanksgiving
Holy God, thank you for your steadfast love and presence.
We’re eager to let our actions help share your love with a weary and worn world. Please accept these gifts, the good intentions of our hearts, and the deep desire we have to help grow your Realm here on earth, as it is in heaven. Fill us with hope and confidence in you, even as you help multiply these resources and our energies for action. AMEN
Invitation to Communion
Many cultures have their own traditions and expectations when it comes to eating. Some records of long-past lives in the Middle East suggest if a stranger came to the village he or she was to be treated as a welcome visitor (and not turned away or dismissed).
That strengthens our understanding that this Table is a place where all are welcome. Here there is an adequate amount of bread and juice for all to share in a feast of faith.
As we launch into Lent, come!
Here’s strength for you who are setting out on this 40 day journey.
Here’s assurance you are not alone.
Come to the mercy seat!
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