Faith Lutheran Church Watseka Illinois

09/25/2025

Don't forget to go to the Faith Lutheran Website for the Daily Devotion.

Welcome to Faith Lutheran Church Knowing Christ, Growing in grace, Making Christ Known A congregation of the AALC Divine Service – Sunday Mornings at 9:00 AM Bible Study – Sunday Mornings following Divine service For more Worship, Study and Fellowship Opportunities, see calendar Calendar Our Pas...

09/23/2025

New Daily Devotions on

Welcome to Faith Lutheran Church Knowing Christ, Growing in grace, Making Christ Known A congregation of the AALC Divine Service – Sunday Mornings at 9:00 AM Bible Study – Sunday Mornings following Divine service For more Worship, Study and Fellowship Opportunities, see calendar Calendar Our Pas...

09/04/2025

Just a reminder that if you're looking for the Daily Devotions you can find them at Faithlutheranwatseka.com

08/18/2025

Want to see those Daily Devotions again? Go to www.faithlutheranwatseka.com and look to the Daily Devotion tab in the menu across the top of the page and it will take you to the latest of the Daily Devotions I've posted over the past month.

Welcome to Faith Lutheran Church Knowing Christ, Growing in grace, Making Christ Known A congregation of the AALC Divine Service – Sunday Mornings at 9:00 AM Bible Study – Sunday Mornings following Divine service For more Worship, Study and Fellowship Opportunities, see calendar Calendar Our Pas...

07/31/2025

I will be posting Daily Devotions from now on at the Faithlutheranwatseka.com. I am still tweaking the style so please be patient with me. When you get to the website. You will see the words "Daily Devotions" in the middle of a Menu across the top above the picture of the Church.

07/28/2025

Daily Devotion can be seen at FaithLutheranWatseka.com

07/03/2025

July 4th is about celebrating American Freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution. Come join us at 7pm for a hotdog meal. Stay and enjoy the Watseka fireworks in our parking lot, or on the grassy field next to it. We hope to see you there.

06/18/2025

Very soon I will be posting the Daily Devotions at the FaithlutheranWatseka.com website. Stay tuned for updates.

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06/14/2025

I apologize that I haven't posted the devotions over the past few days. I was doing it through Meta so that I could schedule them out over a week, or more, but I was then charged on my own personal debit account twice. I don't believe it's right that a church organization should have to pay to do such a service. I will post devotions again, but will not be able to schedule them out as I had done. Please be patient.

Thank you,
Pastor Strohkirch

06/09/2025

Daily Devotion for Monday after Pentecost June 9, 2025
Psalmody: Psalm 128
Additional Psalm: 72

Old Testament Reading: Numbers 22:1-20
New Testament Reading: Luke 22:1-23

Writing—Augsburg Confession XXIV 28-39
Scripture teaches that we are justified before God, through faith in Christ, when we believe that our sins are forgiven for Christ’s sake. Now if the Mass takes away the sins of the living and the dead simply by performing it, justification comes by doing Masses, and not of faith. Scripture does not allow this.
But Christ commands us, “Do this in remembrance of Me” (Luke 22:19). Therefore, the Mass was instituted so that those who use the Sacrament should remember, in faith the benefits they receive though Christ and how their anxious consciences are cheered and comforted. To remember Christ is to remember His benefits. It means to realize that they are truly offered to us. It is not enough only to remember history. (The Jewish people and the un-godly also remember this.) Therefore, the Mass is to be used for administering the Sacrament to those that need consolation. Ambros says, “Because I always sin, I always need to take the medicine.”
Because the mass is for the purpose of giving the Sacrament, we have Communion every holy day, and if anyone desires the Sacrament, we also offer it on other days, when it is given to all who ask for it. This custom is not new in the Church. . . . Chrysostom says, ‘that the priest stands daily at the altar, inviting some to the communion and keeping back others.” It appears from the ancient council decisions that one person celebrated the Mass from whom all the other presbyters and deacons received the body of the Lord. The records of the decisions of the Council of Nicaea state, “Let the deacons according to their order, receive the Holy Communion after the presbyters, from the bishop of from a presbyter.” Paul, in 1 Corinthians 11:33, has this command in regard to Communion: “Waith for one another” so that there may be a common participation.

Hymnody—Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands (LSB 458 v. 6)
So let us keep the festival
To which the Lord invites us;
Christ is Himself the joy of all,
The sun that warms and lights us.
Now Hisgrace to us imparts
Eternal sunshine to our hearts;
The night of sin is ended.,
Alleluia!

Prayer of the Day
O God, who gave Your Holy Spirit to the apostles, grant us that same Spirit that we live in faith and abide in peace; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen

06/08/2025

Daily Devotion for Pentecost Sunday June 8, 2025
Psalmody: Psalm 135:8-14
Additional Psalm: 58

Old Testament Reading-Numbers 21:10-35
New Testament Reading-Luke 21:20-38

Writing:--Martin Luther
For that love of God is so great that we are able to have confidence on the day of Judgment, on which the whole world will tremble. Is. 28:16; “Behold, I am laying in Zion for a foundation a Sone, a tested Stone, a precious Cornerstone, of a sure foundation.” Therefore through the knowledge of this love we also have faith, so that we can pass master at the judgment. Thus Christ also warns by means of the parable of the fig tree in Luke 21:28: “Look up, and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” This is what the blood of love which was shed for us does—the blood which is more precious than all the merits and death of all the saints. But the fact that we do not consider this fittingly and do not treat of this blood in a manner that is sufficiently fitting, this is due to our very education, by which we have been brought up in various ways ever since our childhood to observe human traditions and inventions.
The devil knows this weakness of the flesh, namely, that we do not fittingly value the blood of Christ. Therefore if consciousness of a great sin weighs you down, comfort yourself with this blood of love. Surely the whole world does not grasp the tiniest syllable of the statement that God is love. No human religion an hold its own in the face of the judgment, but it is solely in the blood of Christ that we have confidence on the day of Judgment.

Hymnody—Come Holy Ghost, God and Lord. (LSB 497 v. 3
Come, holy Fire, comfort true,
Grant us the will Your work to do
And in Your service to abide;
Let trials turn us not aside.
Lord by Your pow’r prepare each heart,
And to our weakness strength impart
That bravely here we may contend,
Through life and death toYou,
Our Lord, ascend.
Alleluia, alleluia!

Prayer of the Day
O God, on this day, You once taught the hearts of Your faithful people by sending them the light of Your Holy Spirit. Grant us in our day by the same Spirit to have a right understanding in all thing and evermore to rejoice in His holy consolation; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen

06/07/2025

Daily Devotion for Saturday Easter VII—June 7, 2025
Psalmody: Psalm 116:1-4, 16-19
Additional Psalm: 109

Old Testament Reading: Number 20:22-21:9
New Testament Reading: Luke 20:45-21:19

Writing—Georg von Anhalt
Although there is certainly this distinction (as Luther explains) between Christ sitting above in heaven and being in the Sacrament and being in the hearts of believers—for He ascended into heaven in order to be worshiped and confessed there, that He is the Lord, mighty over all things (Philippians 2), but in the Sacrament and in the hearts of believers He is not present for the particular purpose of being worshiped but in order to deal with us there and help us-nevertheless from this it does not follow that He should not be worshiped in the Sacrament as well. For just as our der Lord Christ was born in the flesh in this world not in order to be served but in order to serve us and give His life as the redemption of many (Matthew 21), and He did not appear in the world in the poor form of a servant principally to be worshiped, still He graciously accepted the external honor shown to Him by believers. And He was worshiped by the people with they saw nothing before their eyes but a poor miserable man: the Wise Men from the east worshiped Him in the form of a little Child; the holy angels served Him—they worshiped the Son of Man—who, as John 3 says, stands at the same time before Nicodemus on earth and is in heaven.
Therefore also in the same way, though our dear Lord Christ did not institute His Holy Supper for the sake of seeing and worshiping, nevertheless it is not to be forbidden nor, in addition, to be considered idolatry, but much rather it is to be considered proper and correct when this Holy Supper is held according to the institution of our dear Lord Jesus Christ and when people are present there with all devotion and reverence, and worship there our Lord Jesus Christ, true God and man, who is present in this venerable Sacrament not only according to His divine omnipotence, spiritually, but also bodily, truly, and essentially, yet invisibly, as the one who sits at the right hand of the divine Majesty and is exalted by God and has received a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus Christ, every knee in heaven and on earth shall bow, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is the Lord, to the glory of God the Father [Phil 2:10-11].

Hymn of the Day: Lord Jesus Christ, the Church’s Head [LSB 647 v1]
Lord Jesus Christ, the Church’s head.
You are her one foundation;
In You she trusts, before You bows,
And waits for Your salvation.
Built on this rock secure,
Your Church shall endure
Though all the world decay
And all things pass away.
O hear, O hear us, Jesus!

Prayer of the Day—Almighty and ever-living God, You fulfilled Your promise by sending the gift of the Holy Spirit to unite disciples of all nations in the cross and resurrection of Your Son Jesus Christ. By the preaching of the Gospel spread this gift to the ends of the earth; through the same Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.