September 27th, 2006 at 11:38 pm
This post completes the series.
In the ninth post we covered the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, has mercy on us, and grants us peace. The Agnus Dei and the Distribution retain the focus on what Christ has done for us. The body of Christ is given unto death, and the blood of Christ is shed, for the forgiveness of our sins.
I neglected to mention something about the dismissal in the distribution, that was brought up in CEN tonight at Memorial. Here in the dismissal: “The body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen and preserve you in body and soul to life everlasting,” there is no may. We do not say, “May the body and blood…strengthen and preserve.” Where we make statements about what Jesus does and what happens in the Mass, there is no wish. Even if we don’t feel any different after the service than before, God is at work. There is enough doubt in this world about temporal things than for us to worry about whether God is doing his job saving us. 
Finishing out the Divine Service:
Thanksgiving
We finish out the Lord’s Supper with the Psalm that some people say either at the beginning or at the conclusion of their meals at home.
A prayer is then said, that God strengthen us in faith toward him and in love toward one another. This is another one of those cases where we ask for things that are already done, so that we acknowledge that this is what God does.
Salutation and Benedicamus
Another Salutation is given to close out the service of the sacrament.
Benedicamus - Latin for “let us bless”. This may have come into the liturgy around AD 1000. We praise and thank God who benefits us. The LSB doesn’t mention a verse here, but Psalm 104:1 fits. To borrow a common catechetical construction, God is blessed without our blessing him, but we desire that his name is blessed among us as well.
Benediction
The Benediction is quoted from Numbers 6:24-26 and was commanded (v. 22-23) by God for use in the Temple and synagogue. One may argue that this is the most ancient part of the liturgy.
This may be buried deep within the Old Testament, but it is Gospel. We were sinful and unclean. God wants no part in sin, and he wouldn’t look at us. Now, he has been gracious to us, forgiving our sin and making us acceptable to him. His face now shines when he sees his creation made new in Jesus Christ. This gives us peace.
The Divine Service concludes with a triple Amen, “that is, yea, yea, it shall be so.”
Summary
Liturgical worship has been with us since the time of Moses. The perfect liturgical form is not commanded by scripture, but in ten posts we’ve seen how much scripture is in the Mass. Memorize the liturgy, and you’ve done several months’ worth of memory work.
Whenever we celebrate the Lord’s Supper we are reminded that we have sinned against God, in thought, word, and deed, by doing things contrary to his will and by leaving his commands undone. Despite this, God loved us and broke the curse that would send us to hell, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus did not stop there. He instituted the Lord’s Supper, where we consume bread and wine and receive his body and blood, in union with the angels and those who died trusting in God’s promises. We are absolved of sin by pastors commanded by Christ to forgive sin, so that we may be free to do God’s will.
Repeated songs and creeds teach the faith even to those who cannot read or even see. When we don’t make it to church on Sunday, or when I watch the kids at home, I try to play Matins or Vespers on the piano. One of my twin daughters, 3½, has already picked up the Gloria Patri without my trying to make her sing it.
The more universal the church service, the easier it is to worship in different congregations. When I travel I pick out a church with a standard liturgy, so I know the melodies and know that the words are doctrinally sound and describe what Christ has done for us.
I am reminded of Pastor Culvert in Shreveport, Louisiana, who told me, “even when I mess up in the sermon, the liturgy saves me.” Without the doctrinal content of Divine Service, the pastor has to work especially hard to deliver the faith in the sermon and hymns. He’s human. He won’t succeed 100% of the time. The Mass saves him. His congregation has grown because people see liturgical worship as counter-cultural, offering objective truth in a world of relativism.
Thus concludes the series. Information was drawn from the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia, the LCMS Christian Cyclopedia, Wikipedia (I tried not to use anything disputed ), and Lex Orandi. Researching for the posts has been informative for me, so I thank the producers of all these resources.
I hope this has been interesting, informative, and discussable. I would love to hear any addendums to the material presented.
Soli Deo Gloria.
September 28th, 2006 at 10:33 am
Rubrics. Did you mention rubrics?
For instance, the pastor crosses himself various parts of the liturgy (invocation, creed, the “Our Father…”, the reading of the Gospel (crossing his mouth even!), before and after the Eucharist and benediction.), we cross ourselves and our kids will cross themselves.
Or bowing… before entering the santuary, before and after the reception of the Eucharist, the Gloria Patri, and leaving the sanctuary.
Or heaven forbid, the kneeling at private confession and the Lord’s Supper. (Unlike the nonLudderans who don’t bow: “I defy you, God! This is not the true body and blood of Jesus Christ. It’s only symbols. I will not kneel!”)
It’s infectious. Damn liturgy. Always spoiling my contemporary “me”-whoreship.
Good stuff (I’d say something else but won’t), Dan! And good job!
October 8th, 2006 at 2:04 am
[...] Dan at Necessary Roughness completes his exposition on the Divine Service with posts Divine Service 8, Divine Service 9, and Divine Service 10. [...]