Service and Sermon for Nov. 26th

REIGN OF CHRIST SUNDAY

WELCOME, MINUTE FOR MISSION, ANNOUNCEMENTS

CALL TO WORSHIP:
One: Come, praise God, the Almighty One and our solid Rock.
All: Let the faithful shout for joy!
One: Come, praise Jesus the Christ, our voice of truth,
the One who rules our lives with justice and peace.
All: Let the faithful shout for joy!
One: Come, praise God, the Alpha and the Omega,
the One who was and is and shall be forever!
All: Let the faithful shout for joy!

HYMN # 820 Make a Joyful Noise

STORY STOOL

HYMN # Magic Penny

Chorus: Love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.

1. It’s just like a magic penny
Hold in tight and you won’t have any.
Lend it, spend it and you’ll have so many
They’ll roll all over the floor. For …. (chorus)
Words and Music: Malvina Reynolds

SERVICE OF COMMUNION:
One: God be with you.
All: And also with you.
One: Lift up your hearts.
All: We lift our hearts in prayer.
One: Let us give thanks to God.
All: It is good to give God thanks and praise.

One: Loving God, Source of all,
we thank and praise you with our lips and with our lives,
that, having created us and all things through your Word,
you welcome our prayer and praise.
For the goodness of creation
and the glory of redemption, we praise you.
For the law of holiness, inviting our obedience,
and the call of prophets, rebuking our disobedience,
we praise you.

Therefore, with all that is, seen and unseen,
and with all the faithful of every time and place,
we join in the hymn of praise and thanksgiving.
All: Holy, holy, holy God, power of life and love!
Heaven and earth are full of your glory!
Hosanna through the ages!
Blest is the One who comes to bring your justice to earth!
One: Loving God, Holy one,
we offer you praise and thanksgiving over this bread and cup,
because in Jesus Christ, your only Son,
you have joined yourself forever to us, uniting heaven and earth.

Now, therefore, we gratefully remember:
Jesus’ birth into our humanity,
baptism for our sin, compassion for our suffering,
intimacy with our frailty, rebuke of our pride,
bearing of the cross with its death,
and rising from the tomb by the power of God.

On the night before he died,
it was Jesus who took a loaf of bread,
gave you thanks, broke it, and said,
“Take and eat; whenever you do this, remember me.”
Likewise, after supper, he took the cup, saying,
“This is the new covenant; remember me.”
All: We proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,
our judge and our hope.
One: Loving God, creative Power,
blessing your name, we seek your Spirit.
Come to us and bless these gifts of bread and wine,
that they may be for us the body and blood of Christ;
the sign and seal of our forgiveness in him,
and our adoption as the children of God.
As we eat and drink together,
make us one with Christ and one in Christ,
a sign of his eternal reign in all the world.

This sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving
we offer you, loving God,
Through Jesus Christ, our Savior,
In the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.
All: Amen.

SHARING OF COMMUNION:
One: Jesus said: “I am the bread of life,
All: whoever comes to me will never be hungry;
whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

PRAYER AFTER COMMUNION:
One: Eternal and gracious One,
though we live in a world of need,
All: here we have tasted your goodness
and hungered for a world more just.
One: Though afflicted by brokenness and division,
All: here we have heard your call
to be a people of healing community.
One: Though daily we touch our limits,
All: here we have received the fullness of your grace.
One: Send us forth, O God, in faith, in hope, and in love.
All: Amen.

HYMN # 220 Blue Book
1. Here, O my Lord, I see Thee face to face;
Here would I touch and handle things unseen,
Here grasp with firmer hand the eternal grace,
And all my weariness upon Thee lean.

Here would I feed upon the bread of God,
Here drink with Thee the royal wine of heaven;
Here would I lay aside each earthly load,
Here taste afresh the calm of sin forgiven.

This is the hour of banquet and of song;
This is the heavenly table spread for me;
Here let me feast, and feasting, still prolong
The brief bright hour of fellowship with Thee.

Too soon we rise; the symbols disappear;
The feast, though not the love, is past and gone;
The bread and wine remove, but Thou art here,
Nearer than ever; still my Shield and Sun.

I have no help but Thine; nor do I need
Another arm save Thine to lean upon;
It is enough, my Lord, enough indeed;
My strength is in Thy might, Thy might alone.

Mine is the sin, but Thine the righteousness;
Mine is the guilt, but Thine the cleansing blood;
Here is my robe, my refuge, and my peace, ---
Thy blood, Thy righteousness, O Lord my God.

Feast after feast thus comes and passes by,
Yet, passing, points to the glad feast above,
Giving sweet foretaste of the festal joy,
The Lamb’s great bridal feast of bliss and love.
Amen.

PRAYER FOR WHOLENESS:
One: God of endings and beginnings,
God of timeless circles of forever,
All: We celebrate this day the Reign of Christ:
One: child of David, and of Mary
All: sovereign of eternity,
servant leader, witness of truth,
and governor of our lives.
One: Help us renew our commitment and covenant
to be deciples and leaders.
All: Help us live the example and ministry of the same Christ
in whose name we both worship and pray.
Amen.

ASSURANCE OF GRACE:
One: Come Holy Spirit, grant us the Gospel of Jubilee,
the Good News of liberation, freedom, and unity;
All: proclaim the release of the prisoners of division;
recover the sight of those blinded
by hatred, jealously, greed, and power;
grant peace and freedom to the poor,
oppressed and lost. Amen.

HYMN # 703 In the Bulb There is a Flower

SCRIPTURE READING: 2 Samuel 23: 1 – 7
Psalm 132 (part one) (# 855 VU)

CHOIR ANTHEM: Hands Shaped Like a Cradle

SCRIPTURE READING: John 18: 33 – 37
Rev 1: 4b – 8

HYMN # 535 For the Music of Creation

SERMON:
Our readings today are words of praise … It is Reign of Christ Sunday, the day in our calendar that we pause and look towards Christmas … next week we begin the journey of Advent – Advent – coming, arrival, anticipation …the expectation of something important about to arrive …

Advent is NOT a season of rushing around and shopping … Advent is NOT about Santa … Advent is a reminder that the reason for the season is truly the birth of the child in Bethlehem … it isn’t about the guy in the big red suit – it’s about a quiet arrival in a back water village in the hills outside of Jerusalem, which was at that time in the farthest corner of a despised Province of the Roman empire …

So, today, before we begin the journey that leads us to the arrival of the Christ, we pause to offer our voices up in praise to God … Our first reading comes from the lips of King David.

David, now an old man stands on the verge of his death, and begins to look back on a life … a life that, despite his status as the greatest King in Israel’s history – was less than stellar. On Friday at Bible Study when I asked – “what do you think of when you hear King David?” the answer came back – “David and Bathsheba …”

Ah, David and Bathsheba … the king standing on the roof of his palace spies another man’s wife and has her summoned to the palace where he has sex with her, then to cover his sin (and crime) arranges for Uriah’s death …

Yet, there is more to David than just that … David the young shepherd who struck the giant Goliath dead … David the upstart who lead a successful rebellion against King Saul … David who vanquished Israel’s enemies and built a stable and successful empire … David who brought the ark of the Covenant up to Jerusalem and who danced with reckless abandon before it … David the wily king who ruled with an iron fist and kept many forces in line …

But when we scratch deeper, there is much about David and his rule that should rightly cause us pause. David was not a nice fellow – without offering an inventory of his sins and shortcomings, it will suffice to say his life had room for improvement. Yet, history holds him up as an exemplary King … even today the modern democracy of Israel used David’s Star on its flag …

Perhaps in David we see the power of the Holy at work … David looked back on a life that had its ups and downs and proclaimed in our reading his trust in God, even in those moments when he was wandering off … God was with him … the Holy presence of God has never abandoned David, or Israel …

This idea is echoed in Revelation where John offers the whisper of eternity wherein God says – “I am the Alpha and the Omega … the first and the last … the beginning and the end …” The God who was, who is and who is yet to come … There is a strong thread that runs through the Bible reminding us, challenging us, TELLING us – that we are never alone – we are never separated from the love of God – we are never away from God’s presence – we are never far from God …

Such is the Kingdom of God … Who do you say that I am? Pilate, the most powerful figure in Jerusalem asks Jesus … In the movie The Last Temptation of Christ, this scene is set in the stable while Pilate tends to his horses. So unimportant is Jesus in Pilate’s eyes, he doesn’t stop grooming his horse as he asks the questions …

Perhaps that’s the point of David’s words of Praise, John’s prophecy and Jesus answers at trial … Our faith is not about political power or wealth and prestige … our faith is simply that – faith …

Prayer … presence … care … compassion …

We’ve learned in the last few months that our faith isn’t even about a building … The building is important because it tells people “here we are” – but a building is at the end of the day – simply a building …

David didn’t look back and say – “look at my kingdom, my children, my wealth, my power ….” He pointed beyond these things to the presence of God in his life, even when he tripped himself up …

Jesus standing before Pilate points beyond the kingdom, the followers, the wealth, the power … Jesus points to the Presence of God even when his life is on the line …

And John standing on the island of Patmos, knowing that Christians where being slaughtered for their faith pointed beyond the present moment and pointed to the Presence of God, that even in the midst of persecution and death is STILL present …

The challenge becomes – the challenge is – how do we live out that faith?? How do we share with, and show the world what our faith is about??

In one of the commentaries about our readings this morning, the observation was made that we place on thrones people of wealth and power – we have made kings and queens out of sport stars, celebrities and wealthy people. We are shocked when their lives don’t meet our expectations, or perhaps we delight in watching them fall when they are revealed as fallible and fragile human beings filled with faults … In the commentary, the suggested was offered that in the Church – among us – we need to forge a course that runs counter to that tendency.

Perhaps rather than idolizing the Tom Cruises’ Angelina Jolie’s and Bill Gates of the world – we need to look to examples of people who quietly live out their values of faith … Mother Theresa who took her faith and didn’t set out to wow the world, but to care for the beggar she found at her feet … One life at a time she started a movement … Little Hannah in Winnipeg who saw a man living on the street and at 5 said – “that’s wrong …” Our next door neighbour who takes baked goodies to other neighbours when there is a crisis … the guy down the street who shovels everyone’s walk … the store clerk who really means it when she asks – “how are you today?”

The examples around us are legion … we ARE the example … our faith – what WE do is where the Reign of Christ is to be found … We are the signposts that say to the world … Here is the Kingdom of God …

The Kingdom of God is all around us … it is here in the pews among us … it is on coffee row … it is in the bleachers of the arena … it is wherever God’s children share their faith …

Children of God … The Children of God who gather here as Minnedosa United Church - The Kingdom of God is found wherever you share your faith …
and one cup of coffee, one loaf of bread, one loonie, one action, one prayer at a time – let’s begin to transform the world by living our faith …

Children of God – you are the kingdom of God … the Reign of Christ has begun … May it be so - Thanks be to God … Let us pray …

OFFERING

OFFERTORY AND PRAYER OF DEDICATION

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE THE LORD’S PRAYER (# 959 VU)

HYMN # 686 God of Grace and God of Glory

COMMISSIONING AND BENEDICTION: