April 12, 2026 | Word Out!
Download the Bulletin from April 12, 2026
READINGS
First Reading: Acts 2:14a, 22-32
14a Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed [the crowd]: 22 “Fellow Israelites, listen to what I have to say: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with deeds of power, wonders, and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know 23 this man, handed over to you according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. 24 But God raised him up, having released him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power. 25 For David says concerning him,
’I saw the Lord always before me,
for he is at my right hand so that I will not be shaken;
26 therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
moreover, my flesh will live in hope.
27 For you will not abandon my soul to Hades
or let your Holy One experience corruption.
28 You have made known to me the ways of life;
you will make me full of gladness with your presence.’
29 “Fellow Israelites, I may say to you confidently of our ancestor David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. 30 Since he was a prophet, he knew that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would put one of his descendants on his throne. 31 Foreseeing this, David spoke of the resurrection of the Messiah, saying,
’He was not abandoned to Hades,
nor did his flesh experience corruption.’
32 “This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses.”
Second Reading: 1 Peter 1:3-9
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead 4 and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who are being protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials, 7 so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Although you have not seen him, you love him, and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
Gospel: John 20:19-31
19 When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors were locked where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” 22 When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
24 But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
26 A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” 28 Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” 29 Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
30 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. 31 But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.
SERMON—Pastor Dan Peterson
“Why Worship?”
Grace to you, and peace, from God, our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus, who is the Christ. Amen.
Why worship?
What a question to ask, the Sunday after Easter!
Worship is a time where we set aside all the demands placed upon us so that we can focus on what matters or should matter most in our lives; namely God, the source of life and the sustainer of us all.
But periodically, I like to ask, what does it all mean? Why do we sing, for example? Why do we share the peace? Why is there a sermon, and why do we receive the bread and the wine of Holy Communion? Why, in short, are we here? What is the purpose of worship? And why does it matter? What is the purpose of worship, and why does it matter?
Now, before I attempt to answer these questions, I’d like us all to let out a collective sigh of relief. 1…2…3…
Why? Because I am not going to drag you through every detail of the worship service, no matter how interesting I find it personally, and believe me, I could. Instead—I heard a prayer of thanksgiving there. That’s fine—Instead, I would simply like to highlight a few details of the service, so that none of us take for granted what we do here and why.
If you have ever wondered, then, why we sing hymns, or if you could use a reminder of what happens, according to the Lutheran tradition, when we celebrate communion, then this morning’s message is for you.
Now, when I think of a service, as I’ve shared sometimes in the past, I think of it as a play with four distinct acts.
Act One is the Gathering at the beginning.
Act Two focuses on hearing the Word of God and the readings from Scripture, the sermon and the Hymn of the Day.
Act Three is the meal, where we meet Christ in the breaking of the bread, as we heard today in our gospel reading.
And Act Four is being sent out into the world as forgiven sinners, raised to new life in Christ, to be Christ to others, especially our neighbor in need—especially the folks Jesus in Matthew 25 calls “the least of these.”
So worship: a four-act play that includes gathering, hearing the Word of God, receiving the meal and being sent back out into the world.
These four acts are sometimes preceded by Confession and Forgiveness. But here’s the funny thing, confession and forgiveness are not actually part of the play. They’re more like a prologue. Confessing our sin enables us to appreciate the message of grace, the word of mercy that we encounter in multiple ways, hopefully throughout the service. That message of grace, that word of mercy, should free us from our burdens and renew us, recharge us, so that we can go back into the world and perform the play we practiced here, which I will say more about in a moment.
Now we are ready. Now our worship service can formally begin.
Let’s talk first and briefly about the Gathering, Act One. Anyone who knows their Bible should recognize our Service’s opening words, they come from which man in the Bible? Who often begins his letters by saying “the grace of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all”— who says that? The Apostle Paul, get this: the most widely-read author in the history of Western civilization. more people have read or heard Paul than Shakespeare, Aristotle, or… Peterson. (I hope to change that with my forthcoming book, which I hope you all purchase, but Paul, at this point, remains the most widely read or heard.)
The language that we use specifically comes from his first letter to the Corinthians. When I say, “the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.” You respond by saying,
“and also with you.”
…that really was weak. Let’s try that again. You respond by saying, “and also with you.” Why do you do that?
The greeting and its response are supposed to bring us into communion before God as we begin our service. This is also why I face you the whole service, rather than turning my back to you as priests once did in the old Catholic mass. Some of you may recall pre-Vatican II Catholicism; the priest, in Latin, would say the Words of Institution, that is, the words of Jesus to His disciples at the Last Supper, facing the opposite direction. What Martin Luther did was not only change the church, but literally turn around the cleric by facing the cleric toward the congregation, so that our communion could be as one in the body of Christ.
The Kyrie, which simply means “Lord,” likewise deepens our communion as the Mystical Body of Christ, as we chant back and forth that God would have mercy on us.
And the Prayer of the Day—hopefully, this all makes sense—it does two things. It sums up a general theme of the day based on the forthcoming readings, and it draws Act One to a close as we set the stage for Act Two, the Word.
Now, isn’t this exciting? Are you on the edge of your seats as we talk about these four acts of the worship service?
Act Two: the Word. Now, as you know, we have three readings from scripture, one from the Old Testament, a letter from, typically, the Apostle Paul in the New Testament, and a reading from one of its four gospels. Sometimes we sing a Psalm as well. Why?
Why, for example, do we invite someone as gifted as Jenna to come forward and sing the psalm responsively with the congregation? Well, the Bible does us no good if it sits on a bookshelf and stays closed or hides somewhere on your phone in an app, but when we hear it spoken or sung as part of a service or gathering, the latent Word of God in the Bible can become the living Word of God to each of us when we appropriate it for ourselves.
Now let’s talk briefly here about Psalm 23. How many of you, right off the bat, know Psalm 23?
“The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He walks with me through the valley of the shadow of death.
He accompanies me…” accordingly.
Now it’s one thing to read this Psalm as God’s promise to King David. It’s another to hear it as God’s promise to you. “I will never leave you.” God says, “I will accompany you through every chapter of your life, even in its darkest valleys and shadows.” If you hear this promise as a promise from God to you, then the latent word of the Bible becomes the Living Word in proclamation. And historically, Lutheran Christianity has celebrated that. It’s not enough simply to say that the Bible is the Word of God. The Bible comes alive and becomes the Word of God when it is preached and the promises are received.
Now, when I preach or when I proclaim, I strive to do two things, wrestle with the readings and clarify, hopefully, what they mean. But secondly, tease out of them the gospel, the good news that God is always with us, as Psalm 23 confirms, and that in Christ, nothing, now to quote Romans 8, neither death nor life can separate us from God and God’s love. That should be clear.
But here we have a problem. What happens, God forbid, and I’m sure this is rare, if I fail to preach the gospel, or you, for whatever reason, are unable to hear it?
Well, thanks be to God for the Hymn of the Day. The Hymn of the Day further drives home the point of the sermon, because even if the pastor fails at proclaiming the Word of God, the Gospel can still be proclaimed through the hymn. That’s why its words are so important. How often have I been relieved to discover, after struggling to communicate something in my sermon for 15 minutes, that the Hymn of the Day captures in a single phrase or verse? That’s the power of the living word. It can reach us, yes, through speech, but it can also reach us through song, which is part why the Lutheran tradition has such a robust collection of hymnody as part of its worship services, and why we sing these hymns during our worship.
So, pay attention to what you sing. It might be exactly what you need to hear.
Our focus on the Word concludes with the Prayers of the Church and then the Sharing of the Peace. Now, just a quick word about the prayers. The prayers come from a resource called Sundays and Seasons. I edit them, and then I invite our assisting minister to do the same. Why?
Remember what I said earlier? Worship is not a one person show. It’s about all of us, the people Martin Luther called the priesthood of all believers, standing before God and communing with one another as the body of Christ.
Now, we say the prayers for a few reasons. First, they help make us aware of the world around us, especially those in need. That is why, routinely, I include prayers about, for example, people living in Iran, or people living in the Ukraine, or people suffering under civil war in the Sudan, to help us become more aware of the world around us, especially those we are called to serve, namely those in need.
But second, praying for others helps us practice being mindful of others, which enables us better to live for others. Thus, while worship resembles a four-part play, it’s even more like a four-part practice, a rehearsal for the kind of life God calls us to perform out in the world.
And that is why I love the Sharing of the Peace. Even as an introvert, even in times where I don’t want to come out of my shell, it’s in the Sharing of the Peace that we practice being reconciled to our neighbor. It’s not just recess, as Cantor Kyle once referred to it. We practice being peacemakers, which the world needs now more than ever. In so doing, we come together as the Body of Christ, as a prelude to receiving the body of Christ, which brings us—what an incredible transition—to Act Three, the Meal.
Now in the past, when it comes to the meal, I have focused on the similarities and differences we have with Roman Catholics, how we both affirm the real presence of Christ in communion, albeit in different ways. This morning, I would like to say something different. In our gospel reading for today, do you recall when the disciples discovered Jesus is among them? What does he do?
He breaks bread with them, and suddenly, the text says, their eyes were opened. When they break bread together in his name, they become aware of his presence.
Now, for the longest time growing up, I was often asked by evangelicals, have you met Jesus? Or do you know Christ? And I always kind of want to kid around and say, Yeah, I had lunch with them last Tuesday. Didn’t go so well. He doesn’t tip very highly. I had to foot the bill, whatever.
But to be serious here, I can say, not denigrating their experience, but I can say “Yes, every time I break bread with my congregation in His name, I meet the risen Lord.” That’s exactly how Christ continues to be present among us, whenever we break bread together in his name.
Communion, therefore, is more than simply a memorial of Christ’s sacrificial death, as some Christians teach. It’s the way we encounter him among us, both personally and collectively. This is why I say your name or try to say your name when I distribute the bread during Holy Communion. He is here for you and for me in the breaking of the bread and in the sharing of the wine
The Post-Communion prayer sums up the whole experience. Now that we have been assured and strengthened through the sacrament, we should rejoice. Christ has freed us of our burdens, our sins, so that raised to new life in Him, we can return to life in the world and hopefully, in however small a way, make it a better place. That is the end of Act Three. Christ has set us free.
So, we’ve talked now about the Gathering, the Word and the Meal. The last act, briefly, is the act of Sending. The fourth and final of act of our service is this Sending, or going forth. Here you are blessed as you go on your journey, and here you are invited to sing boldly as a response to what you have received, which explains why Cantor Kyle pumps up the volume for the Sending Hymn and the Postlude. We have been reminded of God’s love for us. We have been reassured of God’s blessing upon us, and so, out of gratitude and with joy, we are invited to go forth and share that love with others.
So let us listen when others won’t. Let us forgive as we have been forgiven, let us refrain whenever possible from judgment, and let us love our enemies. For now, the thinking is, “we can do all things,” as Paul says, “through the One who strengthens us,” for the One indeed, who sets us free.
That is the service in four acts: Gathering, Word, Meal, Sending.
And now for a postscript, a takeaway. Here’s what I want everybody to remember from what I said earlier. The four-part play we just described is more like a four-part rehearsal for the life we are called to lead in the world.
That answers the question I asked at the beginning. Why are we here? Why does worship matter? It matters because it gives you and me a chance to rehearse how we might live in the world. To get better, therefore, we must keep practicing. Accordingly, I expect to see each of you here next Sunday!
In Jesus’s name. Amen.