This is a Blessing of Hands liturgy. Today we are seeing the tradition of blessings is being renewed in our church. Often a Blessing of Hands service is used in referenced to healing and for caregivers. This Blessing of Hands service is a response to the ELCA’s motto “God’s Work, Our Hands”. This Blessing of Hands service is meant to be used for the whole congregation! We have all been called to do God’s work. It would be appropriate to use during Rally Sunday, during an Installation service, or at the beginning of a new church year. This is bulletin insert ready. Please be sure your church as the appropriate copyright licensing ( EG.CCLI) for the songs used. Feel free to use different songs appropriate to your worship service and style.

Pastor Kevin Weeks, Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in Humboldt, IA shared a “Litany For Graduation Sunday”. It recognizes the accomplishments and milestones of these seniors, but also entrusts the graduates to God’s care. The litany includes the Pastor, graduates, and congregation.

This can be used as a tool for blessing a workplace. Our Lord Jesus often visited people in their workplaces: Simon Peter and Andrew when they were fishing, James and John in their boat mending the nets, the Samaritan woman at the well, Levi at his tax booth and in the market place. He told stories about people's work as illustrations of God's rule: A sower planting seeds, reapers at the harvest time, a woman baking bread, a merchant in search of fine pearls. Jesus said...

On this day we celebrate you and your years of faithful service here at Bethel as well as the years you spent in your first two pastoral calls. We recognize how God has blessed us through you, and we are grateful to God for sending you to us. As you begin your retirement, though your role will change, we nevertheless invite you to continue to receive and share God's wondrous gifts of grace and to work beside us as servants in God's kingdom. May God's richest blessings be upon you.

Troubled marriages can be a source of stress for many families. When a sibling or a child makes a decision to end a marriage, the whole family is affected. This is one way one family acknowledged the painful loss of divorce.