Reasons for church (in no particular order): #1

May 27, 2025

Dear Friends,

It's true, you can pray anywhere, and you certainly should ("Pray without ceasing", 1 Thess. 5:17). Spontaneous prayer is good, but prayer should also be regular and disciplined. That is, if we only ever pray when we feel like praying, we will neglect to pray as often as we should and for all the things we should.

This is reason #1 (in no particular order) to go to church. At church we pray. We do it with regularity. That is, we do it every week, same time, same place.

And we do it with discipline. We pray for all the things. We pray for God's blessing on his Word in our lives. We pray for our brothers and sisters in their various needs. We pray for our neighbors in their needs. We pray for our world, our nation, our rulers, our families, for good weather, for peace, for the church throughout all the world, for the faithful reception of the Lord's Supper, and for countless other things.

You certainly could pray for all that on your own at home. But do you?

Moreover, we pray together, and Jesus assigns some strength to numbers: "Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them" (Mt. 18:9-20).

So, come to church to pray. Pay attention to the prayers, and praise God for all the good he gives us to accomplish through our petitions!

A few announcements:

• Our circuit Ascension service is this week, on Thursday, May 29th at 7pm, hosted by Holy Cross in St. Cloud. Join in the festival worship and in the fellowship afterwards! Because of the Ascension service, there will be no Wednesday evening service at Concordia this week. Please spread the word!
  

• Join us for hot dogs and a softball game with the folks from St. John's, Kimball on Sunday, June 22 at 12pm after Bible Study! The game will be with a 16″ mush ball, so no mitts are required and all can play. Cheerleaders and base coaches are also welcome! Sign up here if you're interested in playing: concordialcms.com/softball

• The summer edition of our Sword of Gideon Men's/Boys retreat will be on Saturday, July 26! More information available here: concordialcms.com/gideon Invite a friend!

• On Sunday, I announced that I have declined the call to serve a dual parish in Southeastern Missouri. Please keep those two congregations (Trinity in Fredericktown and Zion in Gravelton) in your prayers as they continue to seek a pastor! I'm still holding the call to Grace in Little Rock, Arkansas. I mentioned on Sunday that that call is quite different from other calls I've received as well as Concordia, and so there's a bit more homework to do. I'll keep you in the loop.
  

God bless and keep you,

Pr. Buchs