Sunday, Feb. 25

Second Sunday of Lent

For the 11:00 a.m. service on Sunday, the Rev. Dr. G. Malcolm Sinclair is calling his sermon “Lent as Old Visions and Young Nightmares.” “Narrow views of the range of culture and human possibility do much to make us small. Biblical stories are vast. Hearing them afresh stirs something very deep, and very dangerous.”

On this Sunday, we are marking Black History Month. For the prelude Dr. Patricia Wright will play a selection of Spiritual arrangements: Trumpet Tune on "Free at Last" by Dennis Janzer, Deep River and I Want Jesus to Walk with Me by Richard Billingham, and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot and There Is a Balm in Gilead by Joe Utterback. The postlude will be Every Time I Feel the Spirit arranged by Judith Maggs. The Metropolitan Choristers will sing I Want Jesus to Walk With Me arranged by Hal Hopson. Accompanied by members of Great Heart, the Metropolitan Choir will sing Hymn to Freedom by Oscar Peterson. The final selection, Nobody Knows the Trouble, was arranged by former Metropolitan music director Rowland Pack. At the Offertory, the Great Heart ensemble will present People Get Ready by Curtis Mayfield, whose work was inspired by the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. The hymns will be No.634 (To Abraham and Sarah), No. 612 (There Is a Balm in Gilead), and No.575 (I'm Gonna Live).

The last piece in the carillon prelude played by Roy Lee will be Over My Head (African-American Spiritual), carillon setting by Ellen Dickinson.

The Bible readings are Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 (the sign of the covenant), Romans 4:13-25 (God’s promise realized through faith), and Mark 8:31-38 (Jesus foretells his death and resurrection).