Advent Gatherings—Third Thursday in Advent
Order of Service
Evening Prayer—LSB 243
Psalmody—Psalm 1 Sung responsively, whole-verse by whole-verse, congregation will begin singing at the second verse.
Office Hymn—Walther’s Hymnal #44—“O Lord, How Shall I Meet You”
1 O Lord, how shall I meet You,
How welcome You aright?
Your people long to greet You,
My hope, my heart's delight!
O kindle, Lord most holy,
Your lamp within my breast
To do in spirit lowly
All that may please You best.
2 Your Zion strews before You
Green boughs and fairest palms;
And I too will adore You
With joyous songs and psalms.
My heart shall bloom forever
For You with praises new
And from Your name shall never
Withhold the honor due.
3 What hast Thou e’er neglected
For my good here below?
When heart and soul dejected,
Were sunk in deepest woe,
When lost from that high station
Where peace and pleasure reign,
Thou camest, my Salvation,
And mad’st me glad again.
4 I lay in fetters, groaning;
You came to set me free.
I stood, my shame bemoaning;
You came to honor me.
A glorious crown You give me,
A treasure safe on high
That will not fail or leave me
As earthly riches fly.
5 Love caused Your incarnation;
Love brought You down to me.
Your thirst for my salvation
Procured my liberty.
Oh, love beyond all telling,
That led You to embrace
In love, all love excelling,
Our lost and fallen race.
6 Rejoice, then, ye sad-hearted,
Who sit in deepest gloom,
Who mourn o’er joys departed
And tremble at your doom.
Despair not, He is near you,
Yea, standing at the door,
Who best can help and cheer you
And bids you weep no more.
7 Ye need not toil nor languish
Nor ponder day and night
How in the midst of anguish
Ye draw Him by your might.
He comes, He comes all willing,
Moved by His love alone,
Your woes and troubles stilling;
For all to Him are known.
8 Sin's debt, that fearful burden,
Cannot His love erase;
Your guilt the Lord will pardon
And cover by His grace.
He comes, for you procuring
The peace of sin forgiv'n,
His children thus securing
Eternal life in heav'n.
9 What though the foes be raging,
Heed not their craft and spite;
Your Lord, the battle waging,
Will scatter all their might.
He comes, a King most glorious,
And all His earthly foes
In vain HIs course victorious
Endeavor to oppose.
10 He comes to judge the nations,
A terror to His foes,
A light of consolations
And blessèd hope to those
Who love the Lord's appearing.
O glorious Sun, now come,
Send forth Your beams so cheering,
And guide us safely home.
Readings from Holy Scripture
Deuteronomy 7:1–11 (NKJV)
1“When the LORD your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you,
2and when the LORD your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them.
3Nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son.
4For they will turn your sons away from following Me, to serve other gods; so the anger of the LORD will be aroused against you and destroy you suddenly.
5But thus you shall deal with them: you shall destroy their altars, and break down their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire.
6“For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth.
7The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples;
8but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9“Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments;
10and He repays those who hate Him to their face, to destroy them. He will not be slack with him who hates Him; He will repay him to his face.
11Therefore you shall keep the commandment, the statutes, and the judgments which I command you today, to observe them.
Hebrews 13:10–16 (NKJV)
10We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.
11For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned outside the camp.
12Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered outside the gate.
13Therefore let us go forth to Him, outside the camp, bearing His reproach.
14For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come.
15Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.
16But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
John 17:6–19 (NKJV)
6“I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.
7Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You.
8For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me.
9“I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours.
10And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them.
11Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.
12While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.
13But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves.
14I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
15I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one.
16They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
17Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
18As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.
19And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.
Response—LSB 247
Catechism Recitation—LSB 323, The Third Article of the Creed
Canticle—LSB 248
Closing Hymn—LSB 383, “A Great And Mighty Wonder"
Advent Midweek Series 2025
“The Time Is Near: Redeeming the Days Before Christ’s Advent”
“See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”—Ephesians 5:15–16
Series Overview
Time is God’s gift and our stewardship. It reveals whom we fear, love, and trust. The way we spend it shows where our hearts are set—on the passing world or on the world to come. During this Advent season, we remember that the time is short and Christ’s return draws near. These weeks call us to turn from idols that waste our days, to use every moment faithfully in our vocations, and to live as a people set apart, awaiting the fulfillment of all time in His glorious appearing.
Week 3—“Set Apart: Sanctified for the Day of His Appearing”
First week’s theme: Time reveals the heart’s allegiance. What we give our time to, we worship. Christ alone must enter and dwell in the heart as Lord, driving out every rival that demands our attention and trust.
Last week’s theme: The days are fleeting; every moment is entrusted to us for faithfulness in our callings. The Christian redeems the time—turning from distraction and idleness to serve God and neighbor with attentive hearts and diligent hands.
Theme: The Holy Spirit gathers and sanctifies the Church, calling us out from the world to walk in purity and hope. In a corrupt age, the Christian household remains consecrated to the Word and prayer, awaiting the day when Christ will gather His holy people to Himself forever.
C.F.W. Walther, Lectures against the Theatre (forgive any weird stuff…I recorded myself reading this and had AI transcribe it because there wasn’t a copy/paste version available online!)
I shall notwithstanding mention ten arguments from scripture which ought especially frighten a Christian from attending the theater.
First, the word of God says, Whatsoever is not of faith is sin, Romans 14, 23. Hence, according to scriptures, those works merely are good and pleasing to God that proceed from faith, and all those not emanating from faith are bad works, displeasing to God, and just those works of the unbelieving that shine most and are most admired by the world are but shining vices, as has been justly remarked by St. Augustine, the church father. Now, in a play, a wrong virtue and a wrong vice are represented. Good and bad works are judged erroneously. The shining works of the unbelieving, i.e. shining in the eyes of reason, are extolled highly in the play as most noble deeds, though they be nothing but the fruit of haughtiness, pride, and selfishness. On the other hand, the works of the most pious Christians are represented either as products of ignorance, or as products of enthusiasm, or as products of hypocrisy. The greatest vices are there represented as virtues, or they are extenuated and excused as being quite pardonable matters. Whoever, therefore, goes to the theater goes to the school of unbelief.
Second, the word of God says, flee fornication. But adultery, fornication, and unchastity is represented in the plays as something that might be overlooked easily, perhaps as something quite natural even, yes, as a most amiable gallantry. Why, generally, all features of the plays finally aim at serving the lust of the flesh only. By attending the theater one consequently goes to the school of voluptuousness.
Third, the word of God says, be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. Whom resist steadfast in the faith. 1 Peter 5, 8-9. According to Holy Writ, therefore, a Christian ought to be absorbed by nothing, but his soul should be vigilant and sober. But the design of all plays is to deprive a Christian of all vigilance and soberness. They, one and all, aim at flustering, spiritually intoxicating, yes, bewitching him. The gay-colored adornment of the theater, the splendid illumination, the garments of the actors and actresses, partly pompous, partly unchaste, the song exciting all the nerves, the music drowning all voices of conscience, the continued change of interesting scenes devouring every other thought, all this already is serviceable to this purpose and aims at affecting the looker on, so that he will not, as it were, know himself any more. The pictures there presented to his eyes are of such a nature as to make an impression on him that will be ineffaceable. He steps out of the theater, but the pictures presented to him follow him and still flit about his soul. Asleep and awake he sees them. One going to the theater nearly every day is forever living in a world of dreams. He can no longer reconcile himself to reality, thus growing unfit for his earthly calling and this life. A remarkable instance showing how bewitching the attendance of the theater is and how it intoxicates the senses we find in Augustine's confessions. A certain Alypius, later on Augustine's most intimate friend, before his conversion was a passionate lover of the plays. When he at one time attended Augustine's public discourses, Augustine was just painting the abominableness of the theater in such vivid colors as to induce Alypius to instantly conclude never to attend the theater again. But what happens? One day he is met by his old fellow students and they at once ask him to go to the circus with them. Alypius flatly refuses, but they drag him thither by force. But he says, though you drag my body to that place and seat me there, are you by virtue of this able to direct my soul and my eyes on your plays? No. I shall consequently be absent there and triumph over the plays as well as over you. He sits there with his eyes closed fast. Suddenly, however, the audience sets up a great clamoring. He is worried by curiosity to look about for the reason thereof. Opening his eyes, he catches sight of one of two combatants, vanquished and lying in his blood in the arena. And behold, his former passion for the play is aroused again with irresistible force, so as to make him again for a long time as before a slave to the theater, until after being finally converted to God with all his heart, he fled the theater forever as a den of murderers to the soul. Hence, do not say, attending the theater here and there, or even but once, merely to get acquainted with it, can hardly be so great a sin and so dangerous. Oh, no. Whoever attends the theater enters a magic circle, where he may finally be easily deprived of his Christianity, and thereby of his salvation.
We proceed to the fourth argument from scriptures against the attendance of the theater. 1 John 2, 15-16, we read, Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of the life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. But the playhouses are most eminently the temple of the world, in which it worships its three-headed idol, lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and pride of life sacrificing body and soul. Whoever goes to a playhouse consequently goes to the church of the world.
But still more. Fifth, God's word says, Ephesians 5, 4, Filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, let it not be once named among you, which are not convenient, but rather giving of thanks. In the plays, however, especially in comedies, filthiness, foolish talking, and filthy, or at least unchaste jesting, constitute the principal part, for the world does not wish to cry over sins, but to laugh at them. You, however, that are Christians, do not say, Oh, we shall be very careful not to laugh then. First, you do not know whether you will not laugh when you see them all laughing. Just as Peter, having once stepped into the house of blasphemers of Christ, and been seized with fear of them, finally uttered blasphemies himself. And second, Christian reader, are you not ashamed to go to a place where all kinds of shameful words enter your ear and soil your souls? Oh, leave it hurriedly, and weep bitterly with Peter. Whoever goes to the theater goes to the school of shame. Sixth, scripture says, pray without ceasing. 1 Thessalonians 5, 17. Praying, however, is altogether out of the question in the playhouse. True, they sometimes pray there too. Even a miserable prostitute and courtesan will often pray there with her whorish lips. It even happens that holy baptism and holy Eucharist are mocked on the stage. Why, in order to render his piece most interesting, the German poet Schiller, the greatest favorite especially with the youth, found himself induced to mimic the latter. Besides that, the name of God is taken in vain in the theater. They swear frivolously and curse by all that's holy. And Christian reader, you will pay these cursing players for their cursing. Whoever goes to the theater goes to the school of scoffers.
Seventh, scripture says, be not conformed to this world, Romans 12, 2. Theatrical plays are, however, most properly to be counted among the pleasures of the world. For the church of the New Testament did not get the play from the church of the Old Covenant, which did not know anything of it, but from heathendom. Whoever therefore goes to the theater goes to the school of the world, makes it his teacher, becomes a declared apostate, and above that, perhaps without wishing to do so, yea, protesting against such an imputation, thereby actually pronounce publicly, I will not belong to the Christians, but to the world. I do not wish to be a world-denying child of God, but a child of the world.
Eighth, scriptures say, sit not in the seat of the scornful, Psalm 1, 1. But how may one attending the theater deny his seating himself with the scornful? Where will they sit if they do not sit there? Hence it is out of the question. Whoever goes to the theater does not merely seat himself aside, but even at the feet of scoffers.
Ninth, scriptures say, be not partaker of other men's sins, 1 Timothy 5, 22. It is impossible, however, to go to the theater without partaking of other men's sins, both of the sins of the players and of the audience. For what are you doing by going there? The fact of your appearance in the theater calls upon the actor to sin, to do something on account of which he has ever been excommunicated from the true Christian church. The other godless attendants at the theater, however, who come for the purpose of catering to their flesh, you are confirming therein. And still you mean to say, I dare go to the theater without committing a sin? Oh, may God keep you from this dangerous delusion. Your own sin draws you into the theater, and fraught with many of other people's sins, you go out again.
Tenth, we read in God's word. Teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom, Psalm 90, verse 12. Hence, according to holy writ, a pious Christian is forever to think of his death. But the actor is bent above all on causing people to forget, for some hours at least, that they must die once and appear at the judgment of God. Whoever therefore goes to the theater goes to the school of atheists, whose principal motto is, let us eat and drink and be merry. For tomorrow, mayhaps, we shall be dead, and death ends everything. Now then, dear reader, I would ask you, what will you do? Will you side with Christ or with the world? Will you be an attendant at church or at the theater? Perhaps you will say, I will attend both. Let me then point out to you the word of the prophet Elijah, 1 Kings 18, verse 21. How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him. But if Baal, then follow him. Yea, let me draw your attention to the word spoken to us in the gospel by the Lord himself. No man can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and the mammon, Matthew 6, 24. You cannot serve Christ and the world. Do not therefore divide your heart, but give all your life and soul to Jesus. Do you still hesitate in accepting what heaven offers you? O turn your eyes wholly to its everlasting treasures and glory. Whoever does not wholly give himself up to Jesus must endure pain and anguish in this world, and his wages will be death eternal.
May the good God keep us from this for Jesus' sake and grant us admission to yon heavenly exhibition where, after having closed our eyes in death, we will see God face to face in everlasting joy and blessed light of heaven.
Tertullian, The Spectacles
CHAP. XXVII
We ought to detest these heathen meetings and assemblies, if on no other account than that there God’s name is blasphemed—that there the cry “To the lions!” is daily raised against us—that from thence persecuting decrees are wont to emanate, and temptations are sent forth. What will you do if you are caught in that heaving tide of impious judgments? Not that there any harm is likely to come to you from men: nobody knows that you are a Christian; but think how it fares with you in heaven. For at the very time the devil is working havoc in the church, do you doubt that the angels are looking down from above, and marking every man, who speaks and who listens to the blaspheming word, who lends his tongue and who lends his ears to the service of Satan against God? Shall you not then shun those tiers where the enemies of Christ assemble, that seat of all that is pestilential, and the very superincumbent atmosphere all impure with wicked cries? Grant that you have there things that are pleasant, things both agreeable and innocent in themselves; even some things that are excellent. Nobody dilutes poison with gall and hellebore: the accursed thing is put into condiments well seasoned and of sweetest taste. So, too, the devil puts into the deadly draught which he prepares, things of God most pleasant and most acceptable. Everything there, then, that is either brave, noble, loud-sounding, melodious, or exquisite in taste, hold it but as the honey drop of a poisoned cake; nor make so much of your taste for its pleasures, as of the danger you run from its attractions.
CHAP. XXVIII
With such dainties as these let the devil’s guests be feasted. The places and the times, the inviter too, are theirs. Our banquets, our nuptial joys, are yet to come. We cannot sit down in fellowship with them, as neither can they with us. Things in this matter go by their turns. Now they have gladness and we are troubled. “The world,” says Jesus, “shall rejoice; ye shall be sorrowful.” Let us mourn, then, while the heathen are merry, that in the day of their sorrow we may rejoice; lest, sharing now in their gladness, we share then also in their grief. Thou art too dainty, Christian, if thou wouldst have pleasure in this life as well as in the next; nay, a fool thou art, if thou thinkest this life’s pleasures to be really pleasures. The philosophers, for instance, give the name of pleasure to quietness and repose; in that they have their bliss; in that they find entertainment: they even glory in it. You long for the goal, and the stage, and the dust, and the place of combat! I would have you answer me this question: Can we not live without pleasure, who cannot but with pleasure die? For what is our wish but the apostle’s, to leave the world, and be taken up into the fellowship of our Lord?8 You have your joys where you have your longings.
CHAP. XXIX
Even as things are, if your thought is to spend this period of existence in enjoyments, how are you so ungrateful as to reckon insufficient, as not thankfully to recognize the many and exquisite pleasures God has bestowed upon you? For what more delightful than to have God the Father and our Lord at peace with us, than revelation of the truth, than confession of our errors, than pardon of the innumerable sins of our past life? What greater pleasure than distaste of pleasure itself, contempt of all that the world can give, true liberty, a pure conscience, a contented life, and freedom from all fear of death? What nobler than to tread under foot the gods of the nations—to exorcise evil spirits—to perform cures—to seek divine revealings—to live to God? These are the pleasures, these the spectacles that befit Christian men—holy, everlasting, free. Count of these as your circus games, fix your eyes on the courses of the world, the gliding seasons, reckon up the periods of time, long for the goal of the final consummation, defend the societies of the churches, be startled at God’s signal, be roused up at the angel’s trump, glory in the palms of martyrdom. If the literature of the stage delight you, we have literature in abundance of our own—plenty of verses, sentences, songs, proverbs; and these not fabulous, but true; not tricks of art, but plain realities. Would you have also fightings and wrestlings? Well, of these there is no lacking, and they are not of slight account. Behold unchastity overcome by chastity, perfidy slain by faithfulness, cruelty stricken by compassion, impudence thrown into the shade by modesty: these are the contests we have among us, and in these we win our crowns. Would you have something of blood too? You have Christ’s.
CHAP. XXX
But what a spectacle is that fast-approaching advent of our Lord, now owned by all, now highly exalted, now a triumphant One! What that exultation of the angelic hosts! What the glory of the rising saints! What the kingdom of the just thereafter! What the city New Jerusalem!3 Yes, and there are other sights: that last day of judgment, with its everlasting issues; that day unlooked for by the nations, the theme of their derision, when the world hoary with age, and all its many products, shall be consumed in one great flame! How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? what my derision? Which sight gives me joy? which rouses me to exultation?—as I see so many illustrious monarchs, whose reception into the heavens was publicly announced, groaning now in the lowest darkness with great Jove himself, and those, too, who bore witness of their exultation; governors of provinces, too, who persecuted the Christian name, in fires more fierce than those with which in the days of their pride they raged against the followers of Christ. What world’s wise men besides, the very philosophers, in fact, who taught their followers that God had no concern in ought that is sublunary, and were wont to assure them that either they had no souls, or that they would never return to the bodies which at death they had left, now covered with shame before the poor deluded ones, as one fire consumes them! Poets also, trembling not before the judgment-seat of Rhadamanthus or Minos, but of the unexpected Christ! I shall have a better opportunity then of hearing the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; of viewing the play-actors, much more “dissolute” in the dissolving flame; of looking upon the charioteer, all glowing in his chariot of fire; of beholding the wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows; unless even then I shall not care to attend to such ministers of sin, in my eager wish rather to fix a gaze insatiable on those whose fury vented itself against the Lord. “This,” I shall say, “this is that carpenter’s or hireling’s son, that Sabbath-breaker, that Samaritan and devil-possessed! This is He whom you purchased from Judas! This is He whom you struck with reed and fist, whom you contemptuously spat upon, to whom you gave gall and vinegar to drink! This is He whom His disciples secretly stole away, that it might be said He had risen again, or the gardener abstracted, that his lettuces might come to no harm from the crowds of visitants!” What quæstor or priest in his munificence will bestow on you the favour of seeing and exulting in such things as these? And yet even now we in a measure have them by faith in the picturings of imagination. But what are the things which eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and which have not so much as dimly dawned upon the human heart? Whatever they are, they are nobler, I believe, than circus, and both theatres, and every race-course.
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