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Worship & Music

Each weekend offers four worship services:

Sunday morning
8:00, 9:20 & 11:45 a.m.
Saturday evening
5:30 p.m.

Learning for all:
9:30-10:15 &
10:45-11:30 a.m.

Worship
Music
Eternal light in St. Paul Sanctuary

Eternal Light

Look up as you step into the St. Paul Sanctuary through the large processional doors. A beautifully-crafted eternal light now hangs as a symbol that this is a place where the Lord dwells.

Rock Island glass artist Mark Fowler has created this hand-blown work of art especially for our Sanctuary. We welcome the constancy of the flame representing the ever-present nature of Christ.

Many Protestant churches have found it meaningful to have an eternal candle or flame burning in their sanctuaries at all hours of the day or night. It can remind us that the Lord “neither slumbers nor sleeps.”

Each week, Harris Schneekloth or Matt Spencer climbs a ladder to replace the seven-day candle that serves as the eternal light or eternal flame enclosed in reddish/orange glass.

Although the eternal flame is a completely optional piece in any church, it is a symbol that can bring devotional meaning to many people. At St. Paul, we are accustomed to having such an ever-burning light in our past sanctuary. It’s an invitation into a sanctuary that is always open for people to stop in and pray.

Lutheran Christians understand that the power of Christ’s presence comes when the community gathers and actually communes, when the sacrament is consecrated and eaten in Christian fellowship.

At St. Paul, the color we have chosen for the glass of the eternal light is red — the color of fire, of Pentecost and the Holy Spirit in the broader traditions of the church. Our eternal light is positioned right inside the main entryway or threshold of the Sanctuary. It is visible to us as we first step into the worship space and as we leave the Sanctuary to be about our Christian lives.

"Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.