To learn more about who we are and what we believe, visit our website at: ELCA.org
ALL SAINTS' SUNDAY
November 3, 2024
To learn more about who we are and what we believe, visit our website at: ELCA.org
ALL SAINTS' SUNDAY
November 3, 2024
Sunday Worship
9:00 a.m.
Mailing Address
38011 Morrisonville Road
Lovettsville, Va. 2018
Sunday Worship
11:15 a.m.
40588 Tankerville Road
Lovettsville, Va. 20180
Mailing Address
P.O. Box 307
Lovettsville, Va.
Join us for Our Online
In-Home-Church-Worship
WORSHIP SERVICE
Zion & Bethel Churches
click below.
Note: Our YouTube Recording does not include
the All Saints' Sunday Presentation
for privacy reasons. You can request a
personal copy of the PowerPoint Presentation
by emailing Pastor Andreas.
Leading us in Worship
Minister - Rev. G. Andreas Armstrong
Pianist - Anne Markert
Thought for Your Day
Dead Man Walking?
What does it take to raise the dead? Like someone who has been dead for 4 days. Their hearts have stopped. Their blood has coagulated. Their brain has ceased to function. Their muscles and body are stiff. The decay is setting in and as the body decomposes a smell arises. Let's throw in the towel and call it quits; in fact, we should have done that days ago. There's no hope. Give it up! Mary and Martha tell Jesus, "If you had been here, my brother would not have died." They believe he could have kept him from dying but now it's over, it too late. "Thanks for coming and sharing your condolences." they might have said. But ... Jesus isn't done yet ... there's more! And neither is Lazarus! At the tomb Jesus says, "Take away the stone." What for they think? Why would anyone want to do that? "Lord," Martha responds, "already there is a stench because he has been dead for four days." But they do as he says and move the stone. I can see some stepping way back, others reaching up hold their noses, and others frozen in their tracks wondering if Jesus is really going in there. Lazarus ain't comin' out, that's for sure! We wrapped him up tight and there's no dead men walking that we know of! So, what's you gonna do, Jesus? Are you really going in, cus we're not!!! No way!!!
But here's where they are wrong. There is a way! God's way! After talking to his father, God, Jesus cries out with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" I can hear some of them snickering and whispering to each other, while others are saying this one's got to be crazy, but I'm gonna hang around long enough just to see what he's going to try next. How's he gonna come out anyway ... with his body all bound up, wrapped in a burial shroud from head to toe? Even if he could wiggle his way out, he couldn't see where he was going. "Watch your head, Lazarus, if you're gonna be hoping out that tomb." What we see as a tomb, Jesus sees as a womb. Here was a place where new life was about to begin again. Our impossible is God's possible! Nothing is impossible with God! And out of the womb/tomb comes a figure wrapped in shrouds of cloth and I can hear him grunting and groaning, shouting "Help me, I can barely move and I can't see a thing! Get this stuff off of me. And what is this smell? I feel like a mummy and smell like you poured burial perfume all over me. I this some kind of a joke? It's not funny!" I'm wondering what I would have done ... would I have been one of the ones who ran up to him at the words of Jesus, "Unbind him, and let him go!"? Today we are called to help each other find freedom from the grave clothes that keep us captive as we worry about life, death, taxes, shelter, food, relationships, work, health and now an election. God is here with us! Emmanuel, my friends, God with us! Never forget that whatever binds us now will be released either in this life or the next. The dead will be raised! On Mount Calvary Jesus fulfilled the prophecy of which Isaiah spoke, "And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces." Today we still cry tears of love but no longer tears of hopelessness. Our hope rests in the one who calls the dead back to life and promises us life everlasting ... and we will indeed see "Dead Men and Women Walking" who are now alive in Christ Jesus! Some were even seen on the day of Christ's rising from the tomb as they walked about the city. On this All Saints' Sunday we look forward with the promise of the empty tomb! We too shall rise again! We have found in Jesus a love that sets us free while at the same time will never let us go! Let's go and tell the world the Good News, remove the death clothes and set them free to truly live and love without fear. It's never too late for dead men to walk again! For with God all things are possible!
Next Sunday
November 10th
25th Sunday after Pentecost
Honoring our Veterans
9:00 a.m. Zion Church Worship
11:15 a.m. Bethel Church Worship
"Steeple2people"
A ministry of Bethel Lutheran Church
We bring worship to your home!
If You Would Like an In-Person
Home Worship Service
just let us know.
Email your request to:
May God bless and remind you
once again, this week
that you are His!
And He truly Loves YOU!!!
Visit us at: BZChurches.org
Find us on Facebook and YouTube
"Zion & Bethel Lutheran Churches, Lovettsville VA"
In Christ's Love,
Pastor Andreas Armstrong
Going <'////><'ing with Jesus!
Serving Zion & Bethel Lutheran Churches
Lovettsville, Virginia
Home/Office 703-624-4309
Visit us at BZChurches.org
Welcome from Pastor G. Andreas Armstrong
I am presently serving the people of Zion and Bethel Churches and what a blessing it has been! God has also blessed me with a wonderful wife and two grown children, our daughter who lives and teaches school with her husband in Costa Rica and who have brought into our lives two wonderful grandchildren, and a son who works as a bartender in California (serving others like his dad?). I have had the pleasure of serving churches in Texas, North Carolina and Virginia since 1982 as part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America before coming here. God is indeed good.
There is so much more we can do when we serve together. That blessing becomes a reality when I, the only one at Church who is designated in writing as a part-time minister, am joined by everyone else here as full-time ministers. We take that calling seriously. I pray you will too if you consider joining this wonderfully blessed team of ministers to live out your faith, hope and love through Zion and Bethel Lutheran Churches. We are called in Christ Jesus our Lord to share the love of Christ from one generation to the next. Let’s do it!
God loves you and so do I!
Email: Coolrev4jc@aol.com
Home/Office: 703-938-9444
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