FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
                                                                          ORDER OF WORSHIP
                                                                        9th Sunday of Pentecost
                                                                               August 10, 2025
 
  
PRELUDE   He Leadeth Me  arr. Jason Payne                                        
 
 
                                                      ANNOUNCEMENTS
– CE/FELLOWSHIP COMMITTEE & WORSHIP COMMITTEE will meet today, August 10 after worship service. 
-TUESDAY MORNING COFFEE GROUP at 9:30ish AM at First Lutheran Mission Coffee House.  
-THURSDAY MORNING BIBLE STUDY will not meet this week.  
 -SESSION will meet Thursday, August 14 at 7:00PM at FPC.
-THANK YOU to all who made our 125th Anniversary celebration so special!
 -THANK YOU to Andrew L'Amour for staffing the office while Rozanne works from home.
        
                          
 
CALL TO WORSHIP
Come and worship the God who is not far away, but near - closer than our breath, deeper than our thoughts.
     We don’t have to search the skies to find God.
     We can feel God’s love all around us.
In quiet moments and in heavy hearts, in kindness shared and beauty noticed, God is with us.
     In the faces of strangers, in the comfort of friends, in the stillness of prayer—God is here.
     Let us open our hearts, and worship the God who loves us completely.
 
 *OPENING HYMN  #611 (red) “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee”
Joyful, joyful, we adore thee, God of glory, Lord of love!
Hearts unfold like flowers before thee, opening to the sun above.
Melt the clouds of sin and sadness; drive the dark of doubt away.
Giver of immortal gladness, fill us with the light of day.
  
All thy works with joy surround thee, earth and heaven reflect thy rays,
Stars and angels sing around thee, center of unbroken praise.
Field and forest, vale and mountain, flowery meadow, flashing sea,
Chanting bird and flowing fountain, call us to rejoice in thee.
 
Mortals, join the happy chorus, which the morning stars began;
Love divine is reigning o’er us, joining all in heaven’s plan.
Ever singing, march we onward, victors in the midst of strife.
Joyful music leads us sunward in the triumph song of life.
 
  
*CALL TO CONFESSION
 
*PRAYER OF CONFESSION 
Loving God, so often we wander - unsure of where we’re going, uncertain of what we need. We forget Your faithfulness. We chase after things that leave us empty. Still, You call to us with love, like a parent longing for their child to come home.  Forgive us for the ways we turn away from You. Help us to feel Your love—not just when we are strong, but even when we are lost, hurting, or afraid. Hold us close. Heal what is broken. And help us to live as people who know - deep in our hearts - that Your love will never let us go. Amen.
  
*ASSURANCE OF PARDON
 
*GLORIA PATRI (on screen)
                 Glory be to the Father, and to the Son,
                 And to the Holy Ghost.
                 As it was in the beginning, is now,
                 And ever shall be,
                 World without end. Amen, Amen.
  
​
CHILDREN’S SERMON
  

PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
 
SCRIPTURE READING
Hosea 11:1-11
1 When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. 2 The more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and offering incense to idols. 3 Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. 4 I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love. I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks. I bent down to them and fed them. 5 They shall return to the land of Egypt, and Assyria shall be their king,
because they have refused to return to me. 6 The sword rages in their cities, it consumes their oracle-priests, and devours because of their schemes. 
7 My people are bent on turning away from me. To the Most High they call, but he does not raise them up at all.
8 How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.  9 I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.
 10 They shall go after the LORD, who roars like a lion; when he roars, his children shall come trembling from the west. 11 They shall come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria; and I will return them to their homes, says the LORD.
 
 
Psalm 107:1-9, 43 (read responsively)
1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever.
   2 Let the redeemed of the LORD say so, those he redeemed from trouble
3 and gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.
   4 Some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to an inhabited town;
5 hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them.
   6 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress;
7 he led them by a straight way, until they reached an inhabited town.
   8 Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love, for his wonderful works to humankind.
9 For he satisfies the thirsty, and the hungry he fills with good things.
   43 Let those who are wise give heed to these things, and consider the steadfast love of the LORD.
  

HYMN # 643 (red) “Now Thank We All Our God"
Now thank we all our God with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things hath done, in whom this world rejoices;
who, from our mothers' arms, hath blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.
 
O may this bounteous God through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts and blessed peace to cheer us;
and keep us in God’s grace, and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all ills in this world in the next.
 
All praise and thanks to God, who reigns in highest heaven,
to Father and to Son and Spirit now be given:
the one eternal God, whom heaven and earth adore;
the God who was, and is, and shall be evermore.
 
 
SERMON  Can You Feel the Love?

EPISTLE READING: Colossians 3:1-3, 8-11
1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
8 But now put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and foul talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old nature with its practices 10 and have put on the new nature, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. 11 Here there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scyth′ian, slave, free man, but Christ is all, and in all.
 
 
AFFIRMATION OF FAITH   (from the Scots Confession of 1560)
We confess and acknowledge one God alone, to whom alone we must cleave, whom alone we must serve, whom only we must worship, and in whom alone we put our trust. Who is eternal, infinite, immeasurable,  incomprehensible, omnipotent, invisible; one in substance and yet distinct in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.
 
HYMN OF RESPONSE  #819 (red)  “Be Still My Soul”
Be still, my soul: the Lord is on your side.
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide,
who through all changes faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heavenly Friend
through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.
 
Be still, my soul: thy God doth undertake
to guide the future surely as the past.
Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;
all now mysterious shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul: the waves and winds still know
his voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.
 
Be still, my soul: the hour is hastening on
when we shall be forever with the Lord;
when disappointment, grief, and fear are gone,
sorrow forgot, love's purest joys restored.
Be still my soul: when change and tears are past
all safe and blessed we shall meet at last.
 
 
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
Concerns: Jan J, Judy Se, JoAnn G, Rozanne P
 
Our homebound or in care members: Richard & Dolores C, Bob F (Pat caregiver), Jan J, Darwin L (Jeanne caregiver), Marlys M, Bob O (Nancy caregiver), Rose P, Joyce R, Steve VB, Dee W  (Please reach out and call)
 
This Week’s Prayer Families: Robby & Donna F, Joel & Bonnie F and family Lynn, Paige, and Gayle
 
 
THE LORD’S PRAYER
Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name.  Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.  For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever, Amen.
 
OFFERING OF OURSELVES AND OUR RESOURCES
              
*DOXOLOGY
     Praise God from whom all blessings flow;
     Praise Him, all creatures here below;
     Praise Him above, ye heavenly host;
     Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.   Amen.
 
 
*CLOSING HYMN   #37 (red) “Let All Things Now Living”
Let all things now living a song of thanksgiving to God our Creator triumphantly raise;
who fashioned and made us, protected and stayed us, by guiding us on to the end of our days.
God’s banners are o’er us; pure light goes before us, a pillar of fire shining forth in the night,
till shadows have vanished, all fearfulness banished, as forward we travel from light into light.

By law God enforces, the stars in their courses, the sun in its orbit obediently shine;
the hills and the mountains, the rivers and fountains, the depths of the ocean proclaim God divine.
We too should be voicing our love and rejoicing; with glad adoration a song let us raise,
till all things now living unite in thanksgiving: to God in the highest, hosanna and praise!
 
  
CHARGE AND BENEDICTION
 
POSTLUDE   Praise the Lord!  arr. Anna Laura Page