Call
to Worship: This morning Jan’s
call to Worship came from Psalm 30: You
turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with
joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will
praise you forever.
Hymn
TiS 477: Jesus
calls us here to meet Him.
This hymn is written by John L. Bell
and Graham Maule who are members of the Iona Community Resource Group who have
collaborated on a number of songs. John Bell is a Church of Scotland minister,
a broadcaster, and former student activist who is concerned with the renewal of
congregational worship at the grass roots level. Graham Maule who studied architecture, became
a youth worker and developed an interest in worship renewal, including lay
involvement in worship.
Prayers
of Praise and Thanksgiving: Jan began by acknowledgement of our
great trust of the Gospel and the new hope which comes with every new day. Also she prayed about our thanks for the
risen Lord and the hospitality of love and forgiveness in our lives. The prayer continued, asking for forgiveness
for retreating in the face of adversity and for living our lives as if they
were small. We asked God for the courage
to step into the abundant lives He has planned for us.
Bible
Readings: John 21: 1-19 Page
833 Revelation 5: 6-11 Page 963
Elaine delivered our Bible readings
this morning. Once again the reading
from John is a familiar story about Simon Peter who denied knowing Jesus three
times and was asked three times by the resurrected Jesus; “Do you love
me?” This surely invites us to tell
God through prayer and our actions - that we do indeed love Him and that we are
also willing to follow Him.
I find the Book of Revelation
challenging as it takes such cautious thought to even try to untangle the imagery
- and in the end, as so many have tried before me to unravel the meanings and
nobody can really agree, it is comforting to simply take away the message that
“God is in control!” Revelation was
written as a letter to be circulated among the Christian churches at seven
important cities in Asia Minor where there had been several waves of
persecutions of Christians by Roman authorities. The vision John received
offered encouragement and assurance to persecuted Christians about God’s
overarching hand being in control with a vision that God would eventually
completely destroy the forces of evil (the Roman Empire). I like this idea and it helps me to understand
the reason for reading from the Book of Revelation at funeral services - when
we like to trust that our loved ones will not have suffered in vain.
Sermon: “Christ
in the Passover”
This morning we welcomed a missionary
from the Jews for Jesus Australia organisation,
which is part of an international organisation of Jewish people who
believe that Jesus is the Messiah and Saviour of the world.
Rahel is an Israeli woman who greeted
us; “Shalom – Peace be with you”. She told us that like many Jews she loves to
travel although she does not wish to be like those Jews who travelled through
the desert for 40 years!
She explained many of the mysteries
and traditions of the Jewish Faith and her Jewish Heritage and laid out a table
with all the traditional elements of the Passover Meal for us to see. The passion for the Jews for Jesus is to
banish the Jewish notion that “Jesus is
for everyone else.” The question they ask is; “If Gentiles can stay Gentiles and believe in Jesus and be saved from
their sins and Jesus was Jewish, why can’t Jews also share in the gift of ‘the
words of life’ and see that God is into details. He is God of everything and he cares about us
and every detail of our life.” Rahel
read to us from Luke 22: Verses 7, 8 and 13 Page 804 which describes the
preparations for the Passover for which Jesus gave detailed instructions to
Peter and John.
Rahel showed humour as she told of the
frenzy of cleaning that prepares the family home for the Passover meal and the
kindness of the wives, who hide a small amount of leaven in an easy to find
place each year, for the husband to find it for the final cleansing of the house
for the seven day feast of unleavened bread.
He does this with a wooden spoon and a feather and burns the remaining
leaven in a fire. The belief is that this ingredient puffs up the bread – like people
are puffed up with sin.
We were interested to learn about the Passover
Seder table which had been set out at the front of the church, showing the
traditional arrangement of six symbolic foods on the Sedar plate. These were two bitter herbs, horseradish and
romaine lettuce to make you cry as a symbol that life is bitter without
redemption; a sweet brown pebbly paste of fruits and nuts that were made into a
mortar by for building (by the enslaved Jews) as a symbol to show that hard labour makes life sweeter; and
a vegetable like parsley, celery or potato to be dipped in salt water to
indicate that life is dipped in tears. There
was also an onion, symbolic of the root of life and an egg to be roasted over a
candle and dipped in water before eating, to represent new life; and a shank of lamb to remind
the family that sacrifices are no longer offered.
Rahel also told us about the special striped
and pierced bread and the role of the children to ask questions and search for
the hidden bread taken from the middle layer in the cloth on the table. We learned of the four cups of wine, being
the Kiddush, (sanctification) the Maggid, (joy) Birkat Hamazon (redemption) and
the fourth for Hallel (Praise the Lord!)
It was challenging to keep up with the
stories of the history of this Jewish celebration and the enthusiasm of our
speaker. However, I understood that the
main message of the day was that God never changes – he is the same, yesterday,
today and tomorrow and although God doesn’t need us it is exciting to remember
that he chooses to work with us and we should work to encourage everyone to
accept Jesus.
Hymn
TiS 72: Come let us
join our cheerful songs
Come,
let us join our cheerful songs with angels round the throne;
ten thousand thousand are their tongues, but all their joys are one.
'Worthy the Lamb that died,' they cry, 'to be
exalted thus';
'Worthy the Lamb,' our lips reply, 'for he was
slain for us.'
Isaac Watts was born in 1674. He showed
great promise as a writer and went to London at 16 to study in the Academy of
the Rev. Thomas Rowe, an Independent minister. In 1698, he became assistant
minister of the Independent Church, Berry St., London and four years later
became pastor. The published hymns of
Isaac Watts are much loved and number more than eight hundred. He died in November 1748, and was buried at
Bunhill Fields, London.
Offering: The offering was taken by Nerida and Alan
with help from Oliver and a prayer was said by Jan.
Prayers
for the People: After a short
musical interlude played by Grahame and the quiet reflection time to consider
our own special needs and concerns for others, Jan prayed for all who have not
experienced God’s love and grace in their lives, for those who are sick or in
need, and specially for the people in Fiji and Vanuatu at this difficult time. She prayed for all those people who as yet
have not encountered Jesus or grown to love Him.
Blessing Song: Shalom to you now
We all know and have sung this song
written by Elise S. Eslinger many times, however after our reflection about the
religious traditions of Jewish people, the call of;
Shalom
to you now Shalom my friends … In all your living and through your loving …
had us leaving the church with
thoughts of Rahel’s greeting of “Peace be with you”.
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