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Worship Order for
Sunday
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Call to
Worship
Psalm 86:11-17
"Teach me your way, O Lord,
that I may walk in your truth;
give me an
undivided heart to revere your name.
I give thanks to you, O Lord my God, with my whole heart,
and I will
glorify your name forever.
For great is your steadfast love toward me;
you have
delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol." |
These words from the Psalmist draw us into worship. We have come
to learn from and express our gratitude to God. In the depths of
our heart we want to glorify the Lord with more than mere words.
We don't wish to only talk the talk. We want to walk the walk of
faith, because God has been faithful and true to us. Even
through our difficult times.
We each come today with the struggles we have faced this week.
These don't get tossed out the window as we worship. Instead, we
bring them to the Lord, who gives us strength to face into our
troubles. Listen again to the Psalmist and be nudged onto the
path of praise and discipleship.
“O God, the insolent rise up against me
a band of
ruffians seeks my life,
and they do not set you before them.
But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious,
slow to anger
and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
Turn to me and be gracious to me;
give your
strength to your servant;
save the child of your serving girl.
Show me a sign of your favor,
so that those
who hate me may see it and be put to shame,
because you, Lord, have
helped me and comforted me.” |
from the
New Revised Standard Version
copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the
National
Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of
America.
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Opening
Prayer
You are the rock solid ground beneath us, O Lord. Upon you we can
depend. No matter what! As we trust in You, we know that You will
never, never, never forsake us. You are the source of our strength.
From you we derive courage for the journey, for you are with us
every step along the way, through deep waters and fiery trials. The
wind of your Spirit propels us forward as we follow your Son, our
Christ. So on this day of learning and loving, waiting and working,
help us to risk and take a chance, and dream and dare and dance with
Jesus. Amen.
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Tercentennial Minute
"Gold
Apples in Silver Bowls"
Prior to their
first baptism in 1708 the original group of Brethren were part
of a larger group of religious refugees living around
Schwarzenau, in the region of the Palatinate in what is now
Germany. Most of these believers, known as Pietists, shared the
conviction of their leader Ernst Christoph Hochmann von Hochenau
that the true church was a spiritual body, and that the outward
signs of an organized church were not necessary.
The first eight
Brethren, however, engaging in group Bible Study, decided that
the church of Jesus Christ must have visible organization and
practice, based only on what appeared in scripture. According
to their accounts, the Brethren were influenced by traveling
Mennonite missionaries – but exactly who? The Mennonites of
that region disagreed with the Brethren on several important
points.
The Mennonites of
that time believed that one should only be baptized after giving
evidence or regeneration in the way one lived life, whereas the
Brethren believed that one should be baptized upon a confession
of faith. Only after baptism would transformation begin.
The early Brethren
believed in a much more concrete church structure than the
Mennonites. The words the Brethren use with communion: "The
bread which we break is the communion of the body of Christ; the
cup which we bless is the communion of the blood of Christ," are
drawn from 1 Corinthians 10, whereas most other Christian groups
draw their communion language from other parts of the Bible.
How could these ideas have come from the Mennonites that the
Brethren knew, historians wondered? One answer came with the
recent translation into English of the book Golden Apples in
Silver Bowls. Originally published in Basil, Switzerland,
in 1702, it seems to have served as a source, or confirmation,
of many of the ideas that the Brethren were developing in their
scripture study. Suddenly it all made sense – Swiss, not
German, Mennonites had provided the spark that helped the
Brethren take action as a result of their study of scripture.
Despite opposition from people they admired, the first Brethren
realized that in order to be true to Jesus, they needed to be
the church of Jesus Christ.
And that's the Tercentennial Minute for July 20, 2008.
by Frank Ramirez, pastor of the Everett, PA
Church of the Brethren
posted by permission
The Everett church
graciously makes available these weekly vignettes from Brethren
history
to all who are interested during this
300th
anniversary year of our denomination.
Frank will be the guest preacher for our Homecoming on October
26, 2008
(this is our congregation's 100th anniversary year)
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Responsive Scripture Reading
Romans 8:18-27
| I consider that the sufferings of this
present time are not worth comparing with the glory
about to be revealed to us. |
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For the creation waits with eager
longing for the revealing of the children of God; for
the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own
will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in
hope that the creation itself will be set free from its
bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the
glory of the children of God. |
| We know that the whole creation has been
groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the
creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of
the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption,
the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. |
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Now hope that is seen is not hope.
For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what
we do not see, we wait for it with patience. |
| Likewise the Spirit helps us in our
weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought,
but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for
words. |
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And God, who searches the heart,
knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit
intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. |
Hymnal #848
New Revised Standard Version
copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the
National
Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of
America.
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Pastoral Prayer
written closer to the time (if not at the
moment)
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Returning
our Tithes and Offerings
Placing our offering in the plate is not like trading one
baseball card for another, or exchanging toys. When we do that,
what we give up is something we have decided we can do without
in an effort to get something better. Ideally, in the offering
we are returning to God from the top of our pile, not the
bottom. At least that’s the way it should be.
(pause)
When you really
think about it, though, what we offer is something we have
decided we can do without. It’s a sacrifice of sorts. That ten
or whatever percent of our income won’t be used for something
else we might want. We give it up. But like the song we just
sang ("Trading my sorrows"),
what we receive from God is much better than anything we might
trade. However, it’s not an exchange, a quid pro quo, a favor
for a favor, a give and take, a tit for tat or this for that.
You see, God gives to us long before we ever think about giving
anything back. We don’t trade up for God’s blessings. We already
are blessed, whether we realize it or not.
Now, does God need
our offering? Good question. Certainly the body of Christ, the
church needs it; and not just the money we might put in the
plate as it’s passed. As the Bible says, we each have a unique
gift, a special ability, something that only we can share. And
this is given by God for building up the body, the church. We
are not throwing away this gift when we share it. Something far
greater is being created by God when these gifts are offered and
operate together.
So, as
the ushers pass the plates and you put your monetary offering in
them, be thinking about your other gifts. What unique ability is
your contribution to building up the body of Christ? Offer this
to God as well, praying, “Yes, Lord, yes, Lord, yes, yes, Lord.
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1 Corinthians 12:12-27
1 - Porque así
como el cuerpo es uno, y tiene muchos miembros, pero todos los
miembros del cuerpo, siendo muchos, son un solo cuerpo, así
también Cristo… For just as the body is one and has many
members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one
body, so it is with Christ.
2 - Porque por un
solo Espíritu fuimos todos bautizados en un cuerpo… For in the
one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks,
slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
3 - Además, el
cuerpo no es un solo miembro, sino muchos… Indeed, the body does
not consist of one member but of many. If the foot would say,
“Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that
would not make it any less a part of the body.
1 - And if the ear
would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the
body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.
2 - If the whole
body were an eye, where would the hearing be?
3 - If the whole
body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be?
1 - But as it is,
God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he
chose.
2 - If all were a
single member, where would the body be?
3 - As it is,
there are many members, yet one body.
1 - The eye cannot
say to the hand, “I have no need of you,”
2 - nor again the
head to the feet, “I have no need of you.”
3 - On the
contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are
indispensable,
1 - and those
members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with
greater honor,
2 - and our less
respectable members are treated with greater respect;
3 - whereas our
more respectable members do not need this.
1 - But God has so
arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior
member,
2 - that there may
be no dissension within the body,
3 - but the
members may have the same care for one another.
1 - If one member
suffers, all suffer together with it;
2 - if one member
is honored, all rejoice together with it.
3
- Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.
English text from the New Revised Standard
Version
copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the
National
Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of
America.
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Benediction
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(para traducir a español, presione la bandera de España)
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