Text
of the Week: … cease to do evil, learn to do
good;
seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the
orphan,
plead for the widow. (part of Isaiah 1:16-17)
Welcome
to our services today and a special welcome
to
any who are worshipping with us for the first time.
During
this morning’s service we share in the sacrament of the
Lord’s
Supper: we invite all who love the Lord Jesus Christ to
share
with us in communion. You can tell from the Bibles I
have used which
parts of the Bible are my favourites. The New
Testament is
well-thumbed, especially the Gospels. And in the
Old Testament it’s
the Book of Psalms that has been opened
more than any
other. Hard on the heels of the Psalms come
the Prophets, and
in particular Isaiah. But Isaiah is a long
book. In Fresh
from the Word our readings from the Bible take
us to the first 39
chapters of Isaiah over the next couple of
weeks. When you
allow someone else to lead you through
even a favourite
book of the Bible they will no doubt take you
to parts of that
book that haven’t recently caught your
attention.
Catherine Williams, from Tewkesbury, does that for
me this week as
our readings build up to a climax in one of my
favourite passages
in all the Bible, the call of Isaiah in chapter
6. There are some
surprises in store as we build up to that
chapter and as we
read that chapter in full. And some of them
are not easy to
get your mind round. But as I read through
them I cannot help
but feel that this wise figure from a distant
past has something
very pertinent to say about the world of
today.
Welcome and Call to Worship
A time of praise with Hy-Spirit
Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer
Play Springwatch highlights of Sherborne while reading
Psalm 84
Sensational Sherborne
Psalm 84 – the Congregation
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord God
almighty!
My soul longs, indeed it faints
for the
courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh sing for joy
to the living
God.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
Even the sparrow finds a home,
and the
swallow a nest for herself,
where she may
lay her young,
at your altars, O Lord of hosts,
my King and
my God.
Happy are those who live in your house,
ever singing
your praise.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
Happy are those whose strength is in you,
in whose heart
are the highways to Zion.
As they go through the valley of the wilderness
they make it
a place of springs;
the early
rain also covers it with pools.
They go from strength to strength;
the God of
gods will be seen in Zion.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer;
give ear, O
God of Jacob!
Behold our shield, O God;
look on the
face of your anointed.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
For a day in your courts is better
than a
thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
than live in
the tents of wickedness.
For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
he bestows
favour and honour.
No good thing does the Lord withhold
from those
who walk uprightly.
O Lord of hosts,
Blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
Lord
Jesus Christ,
For
the promise of your presence as we gather in your name
We
give you thanks
For
the promise of your presence to the end of the age
We
give you thanks
For
the promise of your presence in good times and in bad
We
give you thanks
Be
with us now and forever more,
A
strength for the living of our lives.
Amen.
Look at the birds!
We’ve been watching Spring watch from Sherbourne – and
I will show some clips of birds nesting
Springwatch – chitchat in the nest
Reading: Matthew 6:25-34
“This
is why I tell you not to be worried
about the food and drink you need in order to
stay alive,
or about clothes for your body.
After
all, isn't life worth more than food?
And
isn't the body worth more than clothes?
Look
at the birds:
they
do not sow seeds, gather a harvest and put it in barns;
yet
your Father in heaven takes care of them!
Aren't
you worth much more than birds?
Can
any of you live a bit longer by worrying about it?
“And
why worry about clothes?
Look
how the wild flowers grow:
they
do not work or make clothes for themselves.
But
I tell you that not even King Solomon with all his wealth
had clothes as beautiful as one of these
flowers.
It
is God who clothes the wild grass
—
grass that is here today and gone tomorrow, burnt up in the oven.
Won't
he be all the more sure to clothe you?
How
little faith you have!
“So
do not start worrying:
‘Where
will my food come from?
or my drink?
or my clothes?’
(These
are the things people all over the world are always concerned about.)
Your
Father in heaven knows that you need all these things.
Instead,
be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God
and with what he requires of you,
and he will provide you with all these other
things.
So
do not worry about tomorrow;
it
will have enough worries of its own.
There
is no need to add to the troubles each day brings.
A Hy-Spirit Song
Activities for all over 3
It has been great to share
the GIFT course in our Sunday services, at Explore and in four Day sessions at
North Nibley over the last year. GIFT
stands for Growing In Faith Together.
We began in the Bible with a
set of services, a short course and a day session in the Autumn around the
theme Faith in the Word.
As Christmas approached and
into the New Year we looked at what it takes Being Church, the
Congregational Way: we explored how we are called to be Christ-centred,
Spirit-filled, rooted in the Bible, missional, worshipful, inclusive and
well-managed. That was also the theme of our fourth Day together in North
Nibley in the Summer.
Our second day just before Christmas
and our second course, just after Christmas, looked at what we believe as
Christians and how we are called to live A Life of Faith.
At our third day just before
Easter and on Tuesday evenings in Explore during the summer we are looking at
the way the Christian faith is a world faith that reaches out into the world. Faith
in the World. That’s the focus of
our services now through the summer.
The Christian Faith is a
world faith - it’s a faith lived in the world. It’s also a faith for the world.
Next Sunday we’ll be reflecting on the way we pray for the world – returning to
that theme, thy Kingdom come. When planning this sequence of services related
to this theme six months ago the General Election was set by Act of Parliament
to be on 4th May, 2020. Little did we expect that a General Election
would have come and gone. It was way back then that we invited Adam Coverden
who belongs to St Matthew’s to come and reflect with us on how our Christian
faith does relate to our politics. Hard on the heels of that we will be
celebrating our World Mission partnership, the Council for World Mission’s 40th
Anniversary in its present form and welcoming to our evening service on 16th
July Roderick Hewitt.
At the last of our Gift
Course Explore evenings Maureen Williams will be joining us. Having been to
Papua New Guinea in the 1980’s as a missinonary with the CWM she has kept in
touch with the work of CWM ever since and will be sharing with us her insights
– Felicity and I will also recall some of the involvement we have had with CWM
over the years too. That’s this Tuesday evening.
So where do we turn in the
Bible?
Just as we are beginning
this sequence of services Fresh from the Word takes us to one of the most
political of all the books of the Bible, the Book of the Prophet Isaiah.
You can tell from the Bibles I have used which parts
of the Bible are my favourites. The New Testament is well-thumbed, especially
the Gospels. And in the Old Testament it’s the Book of Psalms that has been
opened more than any other. Hard on the heels of the Psalms come the Prophets,
and in particular Isaiah. But Isaiah is a long book. In Fresh from the Word our
readings from the Bible take us to the first 39 chapters of Isaiah over the
next couple of weeks. When you allow someone else to lead you through even a
favourite book of the Bible they will no doubt take you
to parts of that book that haven’t recently caught
your attention. Catherine Williams, from Tewkesbury, does that for me this week
as our readings build up to a climax in one of my favourite passages in all the
Bible, the call of Isaiah in chapter 6. There are some surprises in store as we
build up to that chapter and as we read that chapter in full. And some of them are
not easy to get your mind round. But as I read through them I cannot help but
feel that this wise figure from a distant
past has something very powerful to say about the
world of today.
We’re going to be focusing
on the first 39 chapters. In case you have any doubts about how political this
book is going to be the opening verse is absolutely clear. This book is going
to be about what’s going on in the southern kingdom of Judah and its capital
city, Jerusalem in the 8th century Before Christ.
The vision of Isaiah son of Amoz, which he saw
concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and
Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
Interestingly, in II Kings 15ff and in 2 Chronicles 26
ff you can read about wat the government of these kings was like. Uzziah was
also known as Azariah: while he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, his
rule left a lot to be desired; the same could be said of Jotham’s rule. Ahaz,
on the other hand, did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord according
to II Kings – his reign was a grim period of trouble. It’s the very last of
these kings who is praised more than any of the others – it’s as if by his
reign Isaiah has been taken notice of.
He had already begun to speak out, in the reign of
Uzziah, but it was in the year that Uzziah died that he had his call … it’s one
of those great passages in the Bible that speaks of the call we all have to take
our faith into the world and make a difference.
In the year that King Uzziah died,
I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty;
and the hem of his robe filled the temple.
Seraphs were in attendance above him;
each had six wings:
with two they covered their faces,
and with two they covered their feet,
and with two they flew.
And one called to another and said:
‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.’
The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called,
and the house filled with smoke.
And I said:
‘Woe is me! I am lost,
for I am a man of unclean lips,
and I live among a people of unclean lips;
yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!’
Then one of the seraphs flew to me,
holding a live coal
that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs.
The seraph touched my mouth with it and said:
‘Now that this has touched your lips,
your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.’
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying,
‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’
And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’
251 I the Lord of sea and sky
As we join company with Catherine Williams of
Tewkesbury, this week, we are going to read some pretty difficult stuff. Isaiah
is relentlessly critical of what he sees going on in the world around him. It’s a pretty grim world.
Hear, O heavens, and listen, O
earth;
for the Lord has spoken:
I reared children and brought
them up,
but they have rebelled against me.
Why do you continue to rebel?
When I read passages like this I cannot help but feel
this is a strange world, a different world, a world long ago. But then as I
make allowance for the imagery, for the language used. The thing that strikes
me when I do Old Testament biblical history is that this is our world.
We are making a mess of things. The abominable
atrocities of the terrorists in Manchester and London Bridge are almost aimed
at stirring up the worst in us – of fear and then of division. And yet they
bring out the best in our communities.
Kensington and Chelsea – the richest borough in the
land has the greatest poverty in the land – the money-saving in the cladding and the absence of any official
emergency response – somehow put the spotlight on the divisions of wealth and
poverty in our society.
The Queen caught summed it up in an unprecedented
Birthday message when she said “it is difficult to escape a very sombre
national mood” and went on to speak of being “resolute
in the face of adversity” and of being “profoundly struck by the immediate
inclination of people throughout the country to offer comfort and support to
those in desperate need.”
The Ofsted report on the inadequacy of children’s
services in Gloucestershire this week I read. One paragraph caught my eye: “The
majority of social workers have less than two years’ post-qualifying experience
and, for too many, particularly those in their assessed and supported year in
employment, the caseloads are too high and include complex cases that require a
good depth of knowledge and experience.
Isaiah’s challenge to his time, is the challenge for
our time. It’s there in verse 17.
It’s not the quality of your worship, not the
festivals you celebrate that count …
learn to do good;
seek justice,
rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan,
plead for the widow.
He also holds on to a vision of God’s way of doing
things – and draws that vision down to his age and his people. 2:2-4
Isaiah 2:2-4
the mountain of the Lord’s
house
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
and shall be raised above the
hills;
all the nations shall stream to it.
Many peoples shall come and
say,
‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of
Jacob;
that he may teach us his ways
and that we may walk in his
paths.’
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction,
and the word of the Lord from
Jerusalem.
and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
they shall beat their swords
into ploughshares,
and their spears into pruning-hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword
against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more.
That’s the resolve we need to share.
Communities coming together in Manchester and in
London.
Commitment to make a difference.
Our faith is a faith for the world of this time.
Whom shall I send?
Who will go for me?
Here am I, send me.
There’s a twist in the tale. Read on in Isaiah 6 and
you cannot help but realise – it’s not easy. People don’t get it. It’s an uphill
struggle. And interestingly it’s the end of chapter 6 that Jesus quotes when
explaining his parables – they are not nice children’s story. They outline a
hard way to follow that’s tough.
Maybe we need to turn again to the presence of Christ,
and a strength from beyond ourselves in the Holy Spirit as we seek strength for
the living of these days.
We look to the challenge of a troubled world
We hear the call to do something about it
We recognise the reality of the troubles continuing
We return to that wonderful imagery from the world of
God’s creation Jesus shared shared with, we meet in his presence and rejoice in
the care of God sustaining us in our commitment
to follow the way
of justice and peace
Songs of Prayer and Worship
Prayers of Concern
Hy-Spirit song
The Lord’s Supper
A Hy-Spirit song
Words of Blessing
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