WELCOME & ANNOUNCEMENTS
BREAKTHROUGH PRAYER: Amazing God, We pray that through the Holy Spirit Your preferred future for Groveport United Methodist Church will be made clear to us. Give us the courage we need to follow You wherever You may take us. We ask that You bind us together in love so that we can bring the Good News of Jesus Christ to our friends, families, and community. Open our eyes so that we may see the amazing things You are
already doing among us. AMEN.
PRELUDE “Holy, Holy, Holy”
LIGHTING OF THE ALTAR CANDLES
*OPENING HYMN “I Stand Amazed in the Presence” #371
CALL TO WORSHIP:
Lord, when we suffer we want relief. We want it to stop.
God’s answer is not to remove suffering, but to redeem it.
Lord, when we suffer we want understanding. We want to know why.
God’s answer is not to explain suffering, but to grant the strength to bear it.
Lord, when we suffer we want control. We want power over our pain.
God’s answer is not control, but presence.
God’s answer is the cross and the resurrection.
Even in suffering God is with us.
HYMN “My Jesus, I Love Thee” #172
FIRST SCRIPTURE READING: Psalm 34:19
AFFIRMATION OF FAITH
Leader: Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is the one true church, apostolic and universal, whose holy faith lets us now declare:
People: We believe in God the Father, infinite in wisdom, power and love, whose mercy is over all his works, and whose will is ever directed to his children’s good. We believe in Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of man, the gift of the Father’s unfailing grace, the ground of our hope and the promise of our deliverance from sin and death. We believe in the Holy Spirit as the divine presence in our lives, whereby we are kept in perpetual remembrance of the truth of Christ, and find strength and help in time of
need. We believe that this faith should manifest itself in the service of love as set forth in the example of our blessed Lord, to the end that the kingdom of God may come upon the earth. Amen.
OUR TIME OF PRAYER (During our time of prayer, the altar rail is open for all who wish to come forward.)
HYMN “Sanctuary”
OUR TITHES AND OFFERINGS “Lift High the Cross”
*DOXOLOGY
*PRAYER OF DEDICATION
CHILDREN’S MOMENTS
SECOND SCRIPTURE READING: John 9:1-12
CHORUS “Thy Word”
Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet
and a light unto my path.
SERMON “Why Do the Innocent Suffer?”
*CLOSING HYMN “There’s Within My Heart a Melody” #380
*BENEDICTION
*SENDING FORTH “Because He Lives” (chorus only)
POSTLUDE “When We All Get to Heaven”
