Sunday Service Marsden Road Uniting Church Oct. 7

After the welcome and notices, Helen Called us to Worship, declaring God had made us a little lower than the angels. An amazing gift that gives us the ability to sense and respond to the Other, even when we are a long way off. But being in that privileged position brings with it responsibilities. We are God's hands on this planet and as God cares for us, so we must care for the rest of his creation.

Helen then offered us the peace of God and we responded, after which we were given the opportunity to pass that peace to those around us, reaching out, sharing through our clasped hands.

Hymn 159 "All hail the power of Jesus name," which is where it starts and finishes, and which heralded the

Prayer of Thanksgiving and Confession.

As we live out each day it is so easy to let time pass without giving due thanks or being quiet so that we can acknowledge our failings fully and openly, and pray for forgiveness and restoration.

So this prayer is so important, as we prepare for the celebration of our redemption by thanking God for his love for us that seeps through us,

moving towards our need...unconditionally accepting and gracious...participating in our pain and grief...releasing us towards new life...never leaving us alone...forgiving and recreating.

Before this most gracious God we humbly confessed - just as we are - and asked forgiveness.

Words of Assurance

It is Jesus Christ who grants us mercy and the boldness to begin again. We know this is from compassion growing out of his being tested, just as we are.

For this we gave thanks, following with the Lord's Prayer, reiterating our acknowledgement of God's holiness, our failures and our need for forgiveness and to forgive.

Reading: Job 1:1, 2: 1-10  This passage, read by Elaine, told of a virtuous man, Job, whose devotion to God was questioned by one of God's angels, "The Accuser". He predicted that Job's devotion would disappear if the good life was taken from him and the tide turned against him.

So God allowed Job to be tested.

Reflection: God's problem.

Helen introduced her homily with a story of a woman suffering, and in pain, complaining to the doctor, "What have I done to deserve this?" His answer was brief - that she had be born.

We are all the same in this respect: we are born and enjoy life's many blessings but with them comes suffering.

No one escapes.

Helen then pointed out that anyone looking for an answer to suffering in Job was going to be disappointed-suffering is a mystery. Helen then took us back to the time when "Job" was written when, as at the time of Jesus and even, in some cases, now, suffering was thought to be caused by a person's wrongdoing.

However, Jesus himself set us straight on that matter..."Whose fault was it that the man was born blind?" It wasn't anyone's fault. As Helen had already pointed out, as had the doctor to the complaining woman, it's part of being alive.

Back to Job: " The Accuser" could not believe that Job could love God without reward: that Job could love him just because God is God: just for the relationship.

God is God on the good days and bad days: suffering is a part of the way we are made. We do not have the right to expect God to behave in a certain way.

God wants a relationship with the people he has made and, God who is love, in Jesus, suffered for no personal gain but for the love of us.

Nothing stops us having that pure relationship with God.

Prayer A plea for help to see God as he is, rather than as we would have him be. To realise that he is there in all circumstances and to ask for the ability to love him in all of them whether we see them as good or bad. To focus on our many blessings and feel as deeply for others in their circumstances, as we do for ourselves in our own.

Hymn 266 " I cannot tell why He whom angels worship" A call to focus on what we can understand rather than on what we do not.

There is so much that is beyond us, but we do know that we have been touched by God (in my case, taken by the scruff of the neck and shaken), which gives us the confidence to continue, knowing that

"At last the Saviour...is king."

Prayers of the People Delma led us in a prayer for peace in a world which is being torn apart by war and famine. She prayed for the pilgrim people of the Uniting Church in  Australia, for God's guidance on our journey and those close to us who need special care.

Our Offering was gathered and with the Communion Elements was Dedicated so that their ordinariness would become special in God's service.

The communion elders, Alan and Ruth joined Helen and we were told that

Christ is the host in the city and all who will come are guests at the feast  

That's the only proviso - "all who will come."

For this we gave the Great Thanksgiving.

Christ be with you/ And also with you

Lift up your hearts/ We lift them to our God

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God/ It is right to give our thanks and praise.

On our behalf Helen gave thanks to God, the beginning and the end of all things. The one that sustains life in the wild of the bush, in the other sort of wildness of the city, in the imposing cragginess of the mountains and the cultivated, life-sustaining countryside.

We gave thanks for Jesus who never turned aside from anyone and who calls us.

For this we praised God with the faithful of every time and place, joining with the whole creation:

Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Institution and Prayer to the Holy Spirit

Helen reminded us of that first time when Jesus offered bread saying, "This is my body, broken for you" and then offered wine, "This is my blood, poured out for you, for the forgiveness of sins".

Helen then prayed for the Holy Spirit to make the common sacred and to envelope us all as we came to the table, remembering and giving thanks.

And then in preparation for leading us into sacred time: "Jesus, I believe, forgive and remove my unbelief and sin."

Then together,

Jesus, Lamb of God, have mercy on us.

Jesus, bearer of our sins, have mercy on us.

Jesus, redeemer of the world, grant us thy peace.

The elements were then distributed and we gave thanks that we had been guests at God's table, praying that we would carry his hospitality into the life of the community.

Hymn 172 " It passeth knowledge"...that dear love of thine...which brings a rebel sinner, such as me, nigh unto God.

Blessing and Dismissal

We were sent out in peace to carry the sacrament into life, praying that we might experience the presence of the living God.

Which we affirmed with great conviction,

Amen. Amen. Amen.