One With All God's People (Especially in Syria and Iraq) - Growing In Faith Together

Throughout the Autumn in our GIFT course we have been looking at the Bible and discovering that it's the Word of Life. On 20th November we shared in Communion and reflected on one of the great themes that runs through the whole of the Bible - the focus on that relationship, that partnership that relates us so closely to God, the Covenant. Earlier in the year we had followed a course prepared by Open Doors on the Persecuted Church. Today was an international day of prayer for our brothers and sisters in Christ in Iraq and Syria.

A recording of this service will appear here shortly.

Text of the Week: Then afterwards I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions.  Joel 2:28

Welcome to our services today and a special welcome to any worshipping with us for the first time. This morning is a Sunday Special. That means our children and young people are going to meet together in the first part of the service and then come through to church. In that first part of the service we will all of us, young and old alike, be preparing for our time of communion. In prayer and praise, in Bible reading and reflection, in preparing the table and in baking the bread we will be preparing to share in something that goes right back to Jesus and that night of his betrayal when he shared the Passover with his closest friends. The Passover meal is a family occasion in which the youngest member of the family has one of the most significant parts to play. As we gather around the table our younger members have something to give for all of us to receive. We invite all who love the Lord Jesus Christ to share with us in breaking bread and sharing the cup. Today is also a day when we join with Open Doors in praying for persecuted Christians in Syria and Iraq. Please sign the petition that is available at church.

A Recording of this Service will be Available Shortly

Morning Worship

Welcome and Call to Worship

STL 40 Lord we have come

Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

Welcome to our services today and a special welcome to any worshipping with us for the first time. This morning is a Sunday Special. That means our children and young people are going to meet together in the first part of the service and then come through to church. In that first part of the service we will all of us, young and old alike, be preparing for our time of communion. In prayer and praise, in Bible reading and reflection, in preparing the table and in baking the bread we will be preparing to share in something that goes right back to Jesus and that night of his betrayal when he shared the Passover with his closest friends. The Passover meal is a family occasion in which the youngest member of the family has one of the most significant parts to play. As we gather around the table our younger members have something to give for all of us to receive. We invite all who love the Lord Jesus Christ to share with us in breaking bread and sharing the cup.

As we come together in a service that comes to its climax in the sharing of bread and the taking of the cup the first part of our service is a time of preparation – our children and young people are sharing in a time of preparation and then in the spirit of that family gathering they are going to share with us around the table.

Our preparation begins in praise of God.

The glory of God in creation. Think of one of those wonderful moments when there is that wonderful sense of the glory of God in creation. Maybe a mountop, maybe a coastal place, maybe the beauty of a flower, maybe the setting sun, caught here by Cynthia on Priory Terrace overlooking the church.

And glory in the God of creation.

There is much to praise God for.

It is this God who cares for each one of us, in this moment, here and now. As Jane Gonzalez reminded us in yesterday’s readings from Fresh from the Word, God holds us in his hands and cares for us. Julian of Norwich lived in the time of the plague, the black death, at a time of wawr and yet ~”she had utter faith in God’s loving providence. God loves us as a mother does her child, totally, completely, without string. God made us, he loves us and therefore he keeps us – treasured, safe, held in his loving hands.”

Julian of Norwich invites us to take a hazelnut and hold it in the palm of our hands – imagine you are holding something such as that.

And in this he showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazel nut, lying in the palm of my hand, as it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it with the eye of my understanding, and thought, 'What may this be?' And it was answered generally thus, 'It is all that is made.' I marveled how it might last, for I thought it might suddenly have fallen to nothing for littleness. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it. And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.

In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that God loves it. And the third, that God keeps it. But what is this to me? Truly, the Creator, the Keeper, the Lover.

It is in Jesus that that love becomes most real – God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

In this is love not that we lovd God but that he loved us and gave his son to be the means by which our sins are forgiven.

God is love.

It is that love of God, that love that will not let us go that is in the words of a Psalm that was one of the great Psalms of Praise used at Passover – the great hallelujah Psalm. As we read these words, let’s make them our own.

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

Let Israel say,

   ‘His steadfast love endures for ever.’ 

Let the house of Aaron say,

   ‘His steadfast love endures for ever.’ 

Let those who fear the Lord say,

   ‘His steadfast love endures for ever.’ 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

Out of my distress I called on the Lord;

   the Lord answered me and set me in a broad place. 

With the Lord on my side I do not fear.

   What can mortals do to me? 

The Lord is on my side to help me;

   I shall look in triumph on those who hate me. 

It is better to take refuge in the Lord

   than to put confidence in mortals. 

It is better to take refuge in the Lord

   than to put confidence in princes. 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

I was pushed hard, so that I was falling,

   but the Lord helped me. 

The Lord is my strength and my might;

   he has become my salvation.

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

There are glad songs of victory in the tents of the righteous:

‘The right hand of the Lord does valiantly; 

   the right hand of the Lord is exalted;

   the right hand of the Lord does valiantly.’ 

I shall not die, but I shall live,

   and recount the deeds of the Lord. 

The Lord has punished me severely,

   but he did not give me over to death. 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

Open to me the gates of righteousness,

   that I may enter through them

   and give thanks to the Lord. 

This is the gate of the Lord;

   the righteous shall enter through it. 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

I thank you that you have answered me

   and have become my salvation. 

The stone that the builders rejected

   has become the chief cornerstone. 

This is the Lord’s doing;

   it is marvellous in our eyes. 

This is the day that the Lord has made;

   let us rejoice and be glad in it. 

Save us, we beseech you, O Lord!

   O Lord, we beseech you, give us success! 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.

   We bless you from the house of the Lord. 

The Lord is God,

   and he has given us light.

You are my God, and I will give thanks to you;

   you are my God, I will extol you. 

O GIVE THANKS TO THE LORD FOR HE IS GOOD;

HIS STEADFAST LOVE ENDURES FOR EVER!

Let’s join in celebrating the wonder of the God who loves us with a love that will not let us go, the God who is Creator, Lover, Keeper.

A Hy-Spirit song

So much is involved in what we share aroiund the Table – modern theorists remind us that we take things in and learn by hearing, by seeing, and by doing. Jesus knew that instinctively.

Here at the table we hear words of promise from Jesus.

Come to me all you that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you; not as the world gives, give I to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

I am with you always to the end of the age.

Let’s hear those words and treasure them in our hearts.

We see – a table as it is being prepared for us, bread broken, a coup that has been poured out – and in our mind’s eye we see the body of Christ broken for us, the blood of Christ shed for us.  We look to the cross and see the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world, that takes away the sin of each one of us and forgives and renews.

We see the bread cupped in our hands we see the fruit of the vine in the cup as we take it in our hands. As I hold the cup I see the beat of my pulse in the liquid in the glass – maybe that’s just me.

Then I do – I take the break, I drink the cup – and I sense this is real – just as the bread and the fruit of the vine is real so too the love of God in Christ is real – made real by the presence of God with us as we meet in the power and the strength of the Holy Spirit.

As we have heard and seen and done … so too then there is an invitation to put into action the things that we have heard and seen and done in the living of our lives.

Reading: John 13:3-5,12-15, 34-35

And during supper 3Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, 4got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. 5Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.

After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you? 13You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. 14So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. 15For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.

34I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’

STL 29 Jesu, Jesu

One more thing is real to me as we gather here together.  It is that gathering together that is all important. It is not something we do on our own. It is the meeting together – people around us.

Jesus speaks of a new covenant in his blood. A Covenant is a partnership, a commitment, an agreement, a relationship – the story of the Bible is the story of God’s partnership, God’s commitment God’s relationship with all creation, with his people, with each of us.

The covenant with Noah is a Covenant of Peace with All Creation

(Genesis 9:8-17) that reminds us of God’s care for all creation and our responsibility to care for all creation.

The covenant with Abraham is a Covenant of Blessing for all Peoples

(Genesis 15:1-6) that reminds us that our relationship with God is built on faith and for the good of others

The covenant with Moses is a Covenant of Commitment sealed in blood (Exodus 24:1-11) and reminds us of God’s way for us to follow in the world and our commitment to follow the way of life he maps out for us.

The covenant with David is a a Covenant of Commitment to God’s Way (II Samuel 7:1-17) that is expected by God of those in power and gives them a responsibility to work for righteousness and justice.

The tragedy of the Old Testament is the tragedy of history and in a sense the tragedy of humanity: it’s the failure of people to keep their part of the covenant relationship. It is at the moment of greatest collapse that there is a vision shared by the pophets of that time.

They look to a new covenant that is written not on stone tablets but written in the heart.  (Jeremiah 31:31-34). It is a wonderful vision.

It’s that new covenant that is sealed by Jesus around the table in that supper – that new covenant that is written in our hearts as we are drawn into the closest of relationships with God in Jesus Christ by the unseen and yet so real power of the Holy Spirit.

To take the bread and drink of the cup is to re-commit ourselves to the partnership, the relationship, the covenant with God that is written in our hearts – that’s 

·         a covenant of Peace with all creation

·         a covenant of Blessing for all peoples

·         a covenant of Commitment sealed in Christ’s blood

·         a covenant of Commitment to the God’s Way, Christ’s way of justice, peace and love.

That new covenant relationship binds us with each other.  We do not break bread and take the cup in isolation, on our own, in our own place. We come together with those we share a commitment to, those we know, those we are in that covenant partnership with.

It binds us together with all God’s people wherever they may be. A sense of togetherness in Christ.

Earlier in the year we had a time when we focused on the persecuted church and thought especially of our brothers and sisters in Christ facing persecution. Churches up and down the country and across the world are today especially remembering the Christians of Iraq and Syria with Open Doors.

PRAY AS NEVER BEFORE

Islamic extremists are intent on eradicating the church in the Middle East, but many courageous Christians are determined to stay and serve their communities. They're crying out to us - their global church family - for support.

"We need prayer, every day," says a church leader, speaking on behalf of displaced families in Iraq. "When we see pictures of IS (Islamic State) on the television, we're afraid. When we hear that IS has been driven back, we regain hope. Every day our feelings change. So please pray for us every day."

Christians in Iraq and Syria need our prayers and support more than ever before – and Sunday 20 November, the International Day of Prayer for the persecuted church - provides a great opportunity to bring them hope.

Call to Prayer Video Clip

http://www.opendoorsuk.org/churches/international-day-prayer.php

Two things to take with us from this service – that little nut to remind us that we are in God’s hands, Created, Loved, Kept by God.

And a prayer by a Syrian Christian – and photos of Christians in Iraq and Syria. These are the people we are in that covenant with as we break bread and take of the cup.

Prayer by a Syrian Christian – Open Doors

Thank you, Lord,

For all that you have done and are still doing.

I trust your will is always good and finally

you will turn evil to good.

I know you are not silent, but patient…

But how long will it take, Lord?

I am looking forward to a new beginning

amongst my people.

My own desire is that evil will stop

and that we see your glory shine again in

the darkness.

I’m longing for healing, for restoration.

I cry out to you, Lord.

I’m longing for a new generation to take

their place in your kingdom,

To be the light and salt of this nation.

Help me to see my role in this

transformation.

Protect me and be with me.

Carry me, day by day.

And something for us to do

A petition for us to sign.

We call upon our own government and the United Nations to ensure that Christians and other minorities enjoy:

1. The right to equal citizenship 2. Dignified living conditions 3. Aprominent role in reconciling and rebuilding society

The powerfully moving words at the end of that prayer

Protect me and be with me.

Carry me, day by day.  Amen.

That love knows no limits.

It was most moving on Thursday to join in the University with people from other faith communities in Cheltenham where across the faith communities we share in a commitment to bring help and care and love to people whose lives are being damaged by those same extremists of all faiths in that region. Most moving to hear a refugee from Syria speaking of how much she treasured the wrlcome given here in Cheltenham to her family.

481 Love is his word

Prayers of Concern

480 Lord God your love has called us here

We share in communion

Communion Offering & Dedication

Praise and worship with Hy-Spirit

Words of Blessing

Remembering Forwards - Growing In Faith Together

Continuing our GIFT course we came to Remembrance Sunday on 13th November. We found in the Book of Revelation words of encouragement for uncertain times. Through the Autumn our focus is on the Bible and the way it brings to each of us The Word Of Life.

Text of the Week: Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11 

Welcome to our services today and a special welcome to any who are worshipping with us for the first time. During our morning service we shall share in our Act of Remembrance and observe two minutes of silence at 11- 00. Each of us will have different things that we ‘remember’ during those two minutes of silence. Many of those ‘memories’ will have been passed on to us. Some may be ‘memories’ of our own. In the first part of the service there will be an opportunity for people to share what it is they ‘remember’ and things that prompt those memories to stay alive. You could say that in the first part of our service we will be ‘remembering backwards’. I well remember meeting with people who had been in the horror of the first world war. After our Act of Remembrance we will then reflect on the call to ‘remember forwards’. Those who have been caught up in the horror of war share the hope that it will end. We honour their memory by also recalling today their longing for peace. It is as we ‘remember forwards’ and pledge ourselves to the task of ‘making peace’ in our generation that we honour the memory of those who lost their lives in the wars of the last hundred years and more.

Welcome and Call to Worship

37 Our God, our help in ages past

Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

Remembrance is done in many different settings from the Football Stadium to the shop on the High Street to the Cenotaph in London to the War Memorial in Cheltenham. We ‘do’ our remembrance today as we gather together in Church in the name of Jesus Christ and claim that promise he gives that where two or three gather together in his name he is there in the midst of them. And so we turn to one of the most familiar of Christmas readings and discover it has an appropriateness on Remembrance Sunday. At Christmas we will recall that Jesus was born into a world that knew only too well war and the rumour of war – it was a cruel world which led to the slaughter of the innocents in Bethlehem and the flight of Mary, Joseph and Jesus across the Sinai desert to Egypt. The prophets who looked to the coming of a Messiah lived in times of war and the rumour of war. These words from Isaiah 9 speak of the promise of a Messiah who will come into a war-torn land of conflict. This is the Jesus we who is at the heart of our worship today.

Reading Isaiah 9:2-7

The people who walked in darkness
   have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
   on them light has shined.

You have multiplied the nation,
   you have increased its joy;
they rejoice before you
   as with joy at the harvest,
   as people exult when dividing plunder. 

For the yoke of their burden,
   and the bar across their shoulders,
   the rod of their oppressor,
   you have broken as on the day of Midian.

For all the boots of the tramping warriors
   and all the garments rolled in blood
   shall be burned as fuel for the fire.

For a child has been born for us,
   a son given to us;
authority rests upon his shoulders;
   and he is named
Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God,
   Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

His authority shall grow continually,
   and there shall be endless peace
for the throne of David and his kingdom.

   He will establish and uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
   from this time onwards and for evermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. 

So, a task to do for any of the younger members who want to – some pictures, colouring, based on Remembrance and the words of that reading.

MTS 16 My Jesus, my Saviour

Remembering Backwards

On Remembrance Sunday what is it that you are remembering?

A time to share

By 10-50 – Vic’s Remembrance

https://youtu.be/iBAe0CKAQtk

About seven years ago I asked one of our members who had been in the Second World War to share his remembrances – Lorraine’s Dad, Vic – well loved in all the church family, not least by the children. He wouldn’t do it in person, but he did it in his own home. Lorraine asked if we could replay the clip of his remembrance.

We have had handed on to us an Act of Remembrance that we share each year in this church as we name.

Act of Remembrance

In a moment or two we shall stand to remember those who have lost their lives in war, particularly the wars our country has engaged in during the last Century and this:  the First World War, the Second World War, Korea, the Suez War, the end of Empire Conflicts in Africa and elsewhere, the Falklands War, the Gulf War, Bosnia, Kosovo, the Iraq War, the Afghanistan War, the terrorist atrocities of 9/11 7/7 and since.

We make a special remembrance of those who lost their lives from this church, most young men in their teens and in their twenties.

Those who were in that First World War longed that it should  be the war to end all wards.  Those who were in the Second World War longed that it should be the war to tend all wars … as we remember, let us honour their memory in our commitment to work by all means possible for that peace which they longed to pass on to future generations, a peace we pray for in a world that in so many places is still at war.

Will you please stand.

We remember all those who have lost their lives in war … particularly do we remember those connected with this fellowship, Highbury Congregational Church who lost their lives:

W.G. Bowles

DM Brown

G Clayton

C Coles

F Cooper

F Gill

K Gurney

HG Marshall

J Phillips

J Saunders

W Stephens

F Warren

CW Winterbottom

H Woodward

And Paul Chadwick who lost his life in Iraq.

They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old; age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.  At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them.

2 Minutes Silence and then Prayer

S 19 Make me a channel of your peace

Activities for all over 3

Remembering Forwards

When I was getting ready for today’s service I came across a hymn that was written specially for Remembrance Sunday by a modern hymn writer, Fred Kaan. It comes to an end with an invitation

May we, im-passioned by your living Word,
            remember forward to a world restored.

I like that phrase.

Much of what we do on Remembrance Sunday is ‘remembring backwards’. I am of the immediate post war generation. I do not have memories of my own but I do have memories that were passed on to me by my parents. In the early years of my ministry I got to know many people who had fought in the First World War and then those who had been in the second world war. The one thing that sticks in my mind is especially those from the first world war did not want to talk about their experiences. In what they did recall, they would without exception recall the longing they had for the war to end and for them to get back to their loved ones. They would recall their longing for peace.

If we remember backwards to their time we should remember what they were looking forward to, what they were working towards. We honour their memory by pledging ourselves to work for that peace they longed for.

It is one of the tragedies of the wars we do remember that all too often the ending of a war has sown the seeds of further conflict. The harsh reparations imposed at the end of the first world war contributed to the rise of Nazism and so the second world war. The straight lines drawn in the sand by Sykes and Picot and then imposed around the Middle East at the end of the first world war contribute still to the conflict that rages in the Middle East today.

It is a tragedy that is unfolding before our eyes that in the wars against Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya that we have fought in recent years no attention was given to building the peace afterwards and we see how that failure has contributed among other things to the rise of daeash, ISIS and so much that is going on now.

But fort all that in our remembering we can remember the efforts that were made for peace – not least in the wake of the Second World War to introduce institutions that would enable the world to work for peace and not be at war.

Maybe it is our responsibility not only to remember backwards but also remember forwards. What is our task today.

I have a feeling we are in need of some encouragement. The text of the week is not out of place at all.  Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11 

In the first part of our service we read that passage from Isaiah that speaks of the coming of Christ but against a backdrop of war and the rumour of war.

The book of Revelation is written as a letter from John the Divine who is the victim of the violence of repression and persecution to people who are all too aware of war and the rumour of war in the face of Roman might at its worst.

It is a word of encouragement that’s built about remembering forward.

It presents us with a vision of glory in the eternity of God’s love.

Take encouragement from the vision. Keep at it. But more than that. Remember forwards.

Draw down into the present what the vision is about and make that the task to follow.

Reading: Revelation 21:1-4,

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

‘See, the home of God is among ordinary people.
He will dwell with them;
they will be his peoples,
and God himself will be with them;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.’

If God will wipe every tear from their eyes then our task here and now is to wipe away tears, bring comfort to those who mourn, alleviate the suffering of those who cry and are in pain.

Wipe away tears, alleviate suffering, bring comfort. The very specific detailed things we do this week matter: they count. American Novelist, Richard Ford, writing in the paper this week quoted William Blake: “He who would do good for another must do it in minute particulars … General good is the plea of the scoundrel, the hypocrite and the flatterer.”

But the small detail is part of a bigger picture. The vision goes on …

Revelation 21: 22-24;

I saw no temple in the city, 

for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.

And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, 

for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. 

he nations will walk by its light, 

and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. 

If nations will walk by the light of God in Jesus Christ that is why it is so important to work out and apply Christian values in the life of the nations. It is our responsibility to seek to work out Christian values in the life of the nation.

And one more part to the vision …

Revelation 22:1-5

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, 

bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 

through the middle of the street of the city. 

On either side of the river is the tree of life 

with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; 

and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

 Nothing accursed will be found there any more. 

But the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, 

and his servants will worship him; 

they will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 

And there will be no more night;

they need no light of lamp or sun, 

for the Lord God will be their light, 

and they will reign for ever and ever.

It’s a wonderful vision of God’s glory. One to hold on to in the middle of dark times. But remembering forwards to those leaves that are for the healing of the nations gives us a responsibility to be concerned internationally for healing in the nations of the world.

It is no coincidence that out of the aftermath of the Second World war came the churches response to bring healing to the nations in Christian Aid – how vital that work is now not just giving aid, but also helping to shape what should be done to bring healing to the nations.

May we, im-passioned by your living Word,
            remember forward to a world restored.

There was one more part to that conversation I had with Vic Lewis. The conversation moved on to what Vic did next – coming out of the experience of war he felt called to the service of others and devoted a large part of his life to the small detail of doing good through the Order of St John and the work of St John Ambulance.

Remembering forwards – Vic’s thoughts on the service of others and the importance of prayer.

https://youtu.be/jdpzRrUptAc

Hymn: God! As with silent hearts

1          God! As with silent hearts we bring to mind
            how hate and war diminish humankind,
            we pause - and seek in worship to increase
            our knowledge of the things that make for peace.

2          Hallow our will as humbly we recall
            the lives of those who gave and give their all.
            We thank you, Lord, for women, children, men
            who seek to serve in love, today as then.
           
3          Give us deep faith to comfort those who mourn,
            high hope to share with all the newly born,
            strong love in our pursuit of human worth:
            'lest we forget' the future of this earth.

4          So, Prince of Peace, disarm our trust in power,
            teach us to coax the plant of peace to flower.
            May we, im-passioned by your living Word,
            remember forward to a world restored.

Fred Kaan (1929-2009)          

Prayers of Concern

521 Tell all the world of Jesus

Words of Blessing

Retiring Collection

4 Women and 4 Men Tell the Story of Jesus - Growing in Faith Together

On 6th November we continued our series of services following the GIFT Course - Growing in Faith Together. Through the Autumn we are focusing on the first part of the course The Word of Life. Last week we looked at the way the mantle of the Prophets was passed on through the generations and taken up by John the Baptist and then by Jesus and passed on to the 12, the 72, the church ... and to us. This week we focused on the New Testament and looked at the way 4 men and 4 women tell the story of Jesus

Text of the week:  But the Lord said to him, ‘Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel; I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.’ Acts 9:15-16

Welcome to our services today and a special welcome to any worshipping with us for the first time. It’s a day to receive the Operation Christmas Child shoe boxes and to celebrate Street Pastors in our town. It continues to be a special year for us as a church family as we have been reading the Bible together with the help of Fresh from the Word, the International Bible Reading Association. Our Sunday service themes have tied in with the daily Bible reading plan that’s still available in the porch and the more detailed Bible Study notes that many people have been using. Now’s the time to be ordering the 2017 edition of Fresh from the Word. It would be great if we could take forward into the New Year that sense of reading the Bible as a church family together. Have a word with Rachel Jacques or sign up on the list that will be circulating at church. This week we on some of those great Biblical saints: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Mary the mother of Jesus, Mary Magdalene and Paul. Great witnesses to Jesus. “But,” in the words of Vron Smith, this week’s conversation partner in Fresh from the Word, “to know about Jesus is not the same as knowing Jesus. Jesus makes an invitation to each person, an invitation to an ongoing, unfolding, unique relationship that will be like no one else’s. Our choice is to encounter the living Christ, or just to read about him.”  we will be thinking of Street Pastors locally and Operation Christmas Child internationally.

Follow this link for a recording of the service

Follow this link for a recording of the service

You can also click on this link to listen to a recording of our evening service.

In our service last week we looked at the way Elijah, one of the first of the great prophets, “passed the mantle” on to Elisha, who passed the mantle on to Isaiah, Amos, Jeremiah, Habakkuk and all the other great prophets. We looked at the way after a period when the voice of the prophets was silent, John the Baptist “ook up the mantle” of the prophets and passed it on to Jesus who passed it on to the twelve, to the seventy-two and through the ages to us. This week we are going to look at some of the first people who first took up the mantle from Jesus. So for the second part of the service I need 8 voices – four men and four women.  As we look at Jesus through their eyes those words on the green sheet from Vron Smith is very much at the heart of our service today. “To know about Jesus is not the same as knowing Jesus. Jesus makes an invitation to each person, an invitation to an ongoing, unfolding, unique relationship that will be like no one else’s. Our choice is to encounter the living Christ, not just read about him.”

Welcome and Call to Worship

494 Glorious things of you are spoken

Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

Hebrews 1:1-3

In the past, God spoke to our ancestors

many times and in many ways through the prophets,

but in these last days he has spoken to us through his Son. 

He is the one through whom God created the universe, 

the one whom God has chosen to possess all things at the end. 

He reflects the brightness of God's glory 

and is the exact likeness of God's own being, 

sustaining the universe with his powerful word. 

After achieving forgiveness for human sins, 

he sat down in heaven at the right-hand side of God, 

the Supreme Power.

Real lives … real people. The Bible is so much more than words on the page. They are the words of real people who lived real lives and had a real experience of God. And that’s what they wanted to pass on.

There was something very special about Jesus – the way he spoke, what he did, the manner of his death and then that remarkable something that happened on the third day when real people who lived real lives met with him once again and knew that not even death itself could have the last word. His resurrection victory was one they too shared in.

All he ever was, all he ever did, was good news and that was the good news they wanted to pass on.

It’s a strong tradition that goes back to the early days of the church and one that there’s a lot of evidence for.

Down to earth, to the point, John Mark had been a youngster among the followers of Jesus that night Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane. The soldiers grabbed him by he wriggle free from what he was wearing and ran naked into the night. His family home in Jerusalem became something of a base for the church in the very early days. He would never forget the night they had been praying together for Peter who had been arrested and was facing his execution when he turned up, hammering at the door. He got to know Peter more and more over the years: it was Peter’s reminiscences of Jesus that formed the backbone of his telling of the Good news of Jesus. They say, Mark’s gospel was the first to be written.

Then there was Matthew – he’ll forever be associated with the Gospel that bears his name. It’s a measure of Jesus’ passion for people that he ever became a follower at all. He had been trapped in the system the Romans had for getting as much money as possible out of local people. The collection of taxes had been contracted out – and the publican who won the contract, contracted it out again. At each turn someone had to take a cut – and Matthew was the guy who had to bear the anger of the local people as he did his best to get money out of them. Though he came from a highly respected family and was known as Levi, no one had any time for him … no one, except Jesus. Jesus it was who called him, him of all people. And more than that Jesus had actually partied with him and the other ‘publicani’.

There was one disciple more than any others that Jesus had a special love for – maybe he later came to speak of himself as ‘the much loved disciple’. His name was John – what had caught his imagination about Jesus was the richness and the thought provoking nature of his teaching. That’s what he wanted to get down in writing.

And then there was one more. A Doctor by profession he wasn’t’ Jewish and didn’t know much about the country around Jerusalem or Galilee. But he had met with those who had meet with Jesus and as he heard about this Jesus he felt he had met him for himself. When he met up with Paul he joined him on his travels. He wanted to find out more about all that Jesus taught and all that he did and the circumstances around his death and resurrection. He interviewed people who had themselves been there, he read what other people like Mark had written down, he came across a set of the sayings of Jesus. What fascinated him was the impact this Jesus had on all he met even after his death and resurrection. So, not content with telling the story of Jesus he also put together an account of all that the first followers of Jesus did and all that they taught.

Four Gospels – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Just an interesting story.

Or an insight into one whose presence is real as we meet together in his name? Read the story. Meet the risen Jesus … and be changed!

We’re going to be receiving the Operation Christmas Shoe boxes now. It was interesting listening to the video we played as we launched the appeal this year. It spoke of the way the shoe boxes are used by Christians working in all sorts of different parts of the world as a way of giving a present and telling the story of Jesus too.

A Hy-Spirit Song

Activities for all over 3

Meet with Jesus and there’s a whole new way of seeing things, a whole new way of doing things, a whole new way of living.

Maybe it was because he was so very close to Peter but Mark more than anyone else is quite open about the way Peter didn’t get it … and needed to have a whole new way of seeing thngs. There’s a remarkable moment almost exactly in the middle of Mark’s Gospel when Jesus wants to find out whether people are getting the message – you can imagine Peter recalling the moment and Mark later passing on his recollection …

Mark:  he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’ And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’ 

They had got it – they could see the way He had taken up the mantle passed on from Elijah through the prophets to John the Baptist – but there was more to it than that Peter recalled the question he felt Jesus had put to him 

Mark:   ‘But who do you say that I am?’ 

Peter really did feel that Jesus was asking that question of him. He knew exactly … or at least he thought he did. This was Peter’s answer as Mark recalled him saying …

 ‘You are the Messiah.’

You might have expected that Jesus would be thrilled at such a response. But Mark recalled a different atmosphere in the air.

 And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.

Curious … why Jesus should ask them not to say anything about it? The problem lay in the way Peter and for that matter the others saw things. They saw things in human terms. A Messiah, one anointed by God must come in a blaze of glory and put right everything that’s wrong. Such a one must triumph over all the powers that be.

Peter was looking at things in very human terms.  He realised it later. But at that time he didn’t get it when Jesus went on to talk about his suffering and his death and what lay beyond …

Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. 

Peter felt embarrassed at what happened next. But he could see it was a lesson he need to learn. He saw things in human terms. Faced with the prospect of his Messiah being rejected and going to his death Peter stepped in … 

And Peter took Jesus aside and began to rebuke him.

That’s when Jesus turned on Peter … 

he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’

That’s the first challenge reading the Gospels. It’s a very human expectation of God and of religious faith that God will step in and make everything right, that God will overcome all evil.  But that’s a very human way of looking at things. What’s needed is a very different way of looking at things – the way that Jesus mapped out. For God is there in the suffering, when all goes wrong and sticks with us.

As in our mind’s eye we meet with Mark and through Mark with Peter we get a remarkable insight into what it’s like to meet with Jesus.

Meet with Jesus and there’s a whole new way of seeing things, a whole new way of doing things, a whole new way of living.

Matthew was drawn to Mark’s gospel but he could draw on other experiences of Jesus and it’s in his gospel that he brings together the teaching of Jesus that gives us a whole new way of doing things. Nowhere is that more powerfully seen than in the Sermon on the Mount.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for justice, for they wikll be filled.

Blessed are the merciful for they will receive mercy

Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called the children of God.

Chapter 5 is all about loving your neighour.

Chapter 6 is all about loving God and the importance of prayer

And Chapter 7 verse 12 reduces it all to a single soundbite.

‘In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; 

for this is the law and the prophets.

And the challenge not just to hear the words of Jesus but to act on them.

‘Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. 

Luke was also drawn to Mark’s gospel as he investigated everything from the first very carefully and wrote an orderly account of evertything to do with Jesus/ He hadn’t met with Jesus, but he met with people who had and he read accounts of Jesus.

It gave him too a whole new way of seeing things and a whole new way of doing things too – one of the special insights he had was that God was no respecter of persons, that God treated all equally: enter into conversation with Luke and you will discover a way of seeing things, a way of doing things that breaks barriers down and builds bridges up – nowhere is that better seen than in the parable of the Good Samaritan and those final words of Jesus – Go and do likewise.

Three real men living real lives who meet with the real Jesus and see things differently and do things differently.

Luke notices just how much Jesus engaged with women and hear their voices. It’s in his Gospel we meet with Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

It is as she anticipates meeting with Jesus that she sees things in a different way and does things in a different way too.

Luke 1:46-55

‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
   and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
   Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
   and holy is his name.

So often women in those days, too often women in our day, were disempowered. Mary was empowered as a woman by the majesty and power of God.

God welcomes and accepts all.

His mercy is for those who fear him
   from generation to generation. 

 But then Mary has a whole new way of seeing God, a whole new way of doing things. Religion so often had reinforced the powerful and the mighty at the expense of everyone else. But the God Mary encountered as she looked forward to the coming of Christ was the God who turned the accepted order of things upside down, turned it on its head.

He has shown strength with his arm;
   he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
   and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
   and sent the rich away empty.

This is powerful stuff – stuff to make us sit up and take notice, stuff to invite us to do things differently.

He has helped his servant Israel,
   in remembrance of his mercy,
according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
   to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

Our singing invites us to enter into the story – can we make Mary’s words our own and sing the magnificat?

42 Tell out my soul

A whole new way of seeing things, a whole new way of doing things … it’s as we meet with John that we encounter a whole new way of living.

It is the presence of Jesus as he comes alongside real people, struggling with real lives that transforms those lives in the bleakest of moments.

Martha, Mary and Magdalene each face loss that they find overwhelming. They discover in Jesus one who empowers them to move through their loss.

It was when their brother, Lazarus was ill, that Martha and Mary sent a message to Jesus, 

‘Lord, he whom you love is ill.’ 

But Jesus didn’t come immediately. He stayed two days longer in the place where he was.

In the end Jesus arrived to find that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away,and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 

Martha and Mary were both overwhelmed by their loss … but they reacted in quite different ways.

When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 

Martha said to Jesus, 

‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.

There’s a bargaining that sets in at this point. If only … if only … you had come things would have been different.

But with the bargaining goes also a quiet confidence in Jesus.

 But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.’ 

Then comes the most wonderful conversation of dying, death and the resurrection that is beyond.

Jesus said to her, 

Your brother will rise again.’ 

Martha said to him, 

‘I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.’ 

Jesus said to her, 

‘I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.

Then one can almost imagine Jesus looking Martha in the eye when he says to her …

 Do you believe this?’ She said to him, ‘Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.’

It is that response of faith that Martha gives that is an inspiration in so many ways.

Martha then goes back to their home and she called her sister Mary, and told her privately, 

‘The Teacher is here and is calling for you.’ 

And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him.

The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she reacted in exactly the same way as Martha had done: she knelt at his feet and said to him, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’ 

It is at this point, however, that things go in a different direction. Mary is the quiet, reflective one. And at this point she is not up for discussion. She is not in a place where she can share. Instead she breaks down in tears.

When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 

It’s then that we read.

Jesus wept.

Words when words are appropriate.

Jesus is simply alongside when words fail. But he is there. And as the story of Lazarus unfolds resurrection is real.

Resurrection changes things.

The third woman whose story John tells is Mary Magdalene who when she returns to the tomb of Jesus after the Sabbath also breaks down in tears and weeps.

 It is when Jesus, the one she mistakes for a gardener, utters her name that she realises he is risen, he is risen indeed.

Three women and one man.

The man is John.

John tells of those who saw with their own eyes and had faith. He writes for us who have not seen with our own eyes so that we too may find that faith.

John it is who records the words of Jesus to Thomas …

Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

A couple of weeks ago as we were going on holiday, Richard Sharpe sent me a hymn he felt would be good to sing. It was written to mark the 50^th anniversary of the Aberfan disaster.

What do you say? What can you do? In response to the utter horror of such meaningless loss of life?

There’s nothing to do. The local Baptist minister, Kenneth Hayes, lost a son in the tragedy he ministered, and campaigned and simply stayed with his community for many years afterwards … and on film is recorded as turning to those final words of Romans 8 for the inspiration that enabled him through Jesus to see things differently, do things differently and live differently.

The end of chapter 8 of Romans is a great summary of faith - What can separate us from the love of God - It’s a passage I always use when there’s a personal tragedy or disaster and that’s a message we always try to emphasise - I am certain that nothing can separate us from the love of God, neither death nor life, neither angels or other heavenly rulers or powers, neither the present nor the future…

As far as we’re concerned now, we’ve still got two boys. We’re only separated for a time. One day we’re going to meet. The parting and the loneliness and being without him is terrible, but it’s not for ever.

It’s really worth getting to know about Jesus but that’s not enough.

Going back to those words of Vron Smith.

“To know about Jesus is not the same as knowing Jesus. Jesus makes an invitation to each person, an invitation to an ongoing, unfolding, unique relationship that will be like no one else’s. Our choice is to encounter the living Christ, not just read about him.”

It is in that encounter with the living Christ that we will find a whole new way of looking at the world, a whole new way of doing things and a whole new way of living, a whole new life.

God who knows our darkest moments (website only)

A hymn for Aberfan

On 21 October 1966, a coal waste tip overlooking the village of Aberfan, destabilised by rain water, slid and crashed down into Pantglas Junior School, destroying most of the school as well as a farm and twenty houses. The avalanche killed 144 people including 116 children. It’s the worst disaster involving children in modern British history.

The Revd Gareth Hill’s hymn, “God who knows our darkest moments”, was written for personal reasons. Gareth’s father-in-law, the Revd Irving Penberthy, now a supernumerary minister in Okehampton, Devon, is the only surviving church leader from those who were ministering in Aberfan at the time of the tragedy. See below for more information.

Aberfan Cemetery - two rows of white arches mark the graves of children killed in the 1966 colliery tip disaster © Stephen McKay (Licensed under Creative Commons)

God who knows our darkest moments

meets us in our brokenness:

walks beside us as a whisper,

holds our pain in his caress.

God, who leads through shadowed valleys,

where death’s bleakness dims our sight,

speaks a peace beyond our knowing,

floods our anguish with his light.

Far beyond our grief’s horizon,

as Creation holds its breath:

Love Divine, revealed in Jesus,

tears apart the chains of death.

Servant son and humble healer,

by your cross and life laid down

you have carried all our suff’ring

and you wear the victor’s crown.

Lift us up, now, risen Saviour

to the place where mercy plays,

where our broken hopes and heartache

find their healing in your gaze.

This is love, that God has saved us!

This is love, that Christ has died!

We rejoice that love has conquered

and has drawn us to your side.

Words: © Gareth Hill Publishing/Song Solutions CopyCare, 14 Horsted Square, Uckfield, TN22 1QG www.songsolutions.org

Hymn: God who knows our darkest moments

And us – celebrating Street Pastors

MTS 3 Brother, Sister

Prayers of Concern

Hymn: In Christ alone

Words of Blessing