Order of Service - March 25th 2007

WELCOME, MINUTE FOR MISSION & ANNOUNCEMENTS

HYMN # 103 (green book) Morning Has Broken

CALL TO WORSHIP:
One: May the God of grace be welcome in our midst.
All: May we receive the power and peace of divine love.
One: Come let us worship with our hearts and minds and bodies.
All: Let us become one seeking justice and compassion.
One: Blessed be God who challenges, heals, and unites us.
All: Blessed be our learning and blessed be our vision.
Blessed be God who inspires all things to be new.
One: Creating God, still Centre of the world you have made,
we come to you in this season of turning and returning,
All: We do not know how to seek you with our whole hearts,
but we know you are our source and our destiny.
One: In the midst of life, we return to you, we turn toward you.
All: We thank you that you receive even the broken heart,
the troubled conscience, the conflicted spirit. Amen.

PRAYER OF APPROACH:
One: From Bethlehem to Nazareth,
from Jordan to Jericho,
from Bethany to Jerusalem,
from then to now,
All: Come, Lord Jesus.
One: To heal the sick,
to mend the broken-hearted,
to comfort the disturbed,
to disturb the comfortable,
to cleanse the temple,
to liberate faith from convention,
All: Come, Lord Jesus.
One: To carry the cross,
to lead the way,
to shoulder the sin of the world and take it away,
All: Come, Lord Jesus.
One: Today,
to this place,
to us,
All: Come Lord Jesus.

HYMN # 61 (green book) As Comes the Breath of Spring

PRAYER OF CONFESSION: (in unison) see back of Bulletin

HYMN # 82 (green book) Open My Eyes That I May See

SCRIPTURE READING: Isaiah 43: 16 – 21
Psalm 126

HYMN # 44 (green book) Part of the Family

THE STORY STOOL

HYMN Jesus Loves Me
Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so;
Little ones to him belong, in his love we shall be strong.
Yes, Jesus loves me! Yes, Jesus loves me!
Yes, Jesus loves me! The Bible tells me so.

SCRIPTURE READING: Philippians 3: 4b – 14
John 12: 1 – 8

CHOIR ANTHEM: Just a Closer Walk

SERMON:

In the Church, we are a people of stories … Today we have four very distinctive stories that we have shared, and that cause us pause – how do they fit together? What is the common thread that runs through them?

If we begin with the idea of story itself, we start with a powerful understanding of the world. When I served in Bella Coola, I learned the power of story – in the language of the Nuxalkmc the term was Smayusta – the stories, the songs, they mythic tradition not only of the people, but the land and the gods and creatures who share the time and space. The stories of creation were the smayusta entrusted to families and clans to pass on and keep alive. The smayustas influenced and informed ALL aspects of life in Bella Coola. It was the smayusta that gave meaning and sacredness to the land, the people, and the songs and stories … Smayusta was central to the understanding of the world.

To the Jewish faith, story is just as central. Researchers have dubbed this – the axis mundi – literally the axis around which the world revolves and from which all meaning and understanding flows. For the Jewish faith the stories are varied – “a wandering Aramean is my ancestor …”; The whole of the experience of leaving Egypt and journeying to the promised land; the 12 sons of Jacob who become the 12 tribes of Israel; the Macabees and their rebellion – each of these has a meaning beyond simply being a nice story. Each story informs the liturigical and spiritual lives of the people and each contributes to the way in which the people understand the world and their place in it.

Our reading from Isaiah slams head long into this view of the world. Isaiah is speaking in Babylon amongst a people who are far from home and far from everything they know and understand. They’ve been enslaved and in exile – and they are pining for what once was … So strong is their pining for the way things used to be, that they are no longer living fully in the present moment – they are living in a past that very few of them had experienced themselves as adults. Their past is one of stories told by parents and grandparents and retold by these people.

So, in this context Isaiah rises and begins to recall the Passover events and the wonderful things God has done. The people hear him and say – “ah, yes, God has been wonderful to us …” Then Isaiah slams on the brakes. “Do not remember the former things …” he proclaims.

“HUH??!!” the people wonder – “forget about the past? How can we forget the past?” This is an outrage !!

One commentary notes that forgetting about the past for the Jewish people is akin to the modern Chinese just forgetting about the Cultural Revolution, or the Australians forgetting about Galipoli, or the Americans and the French forgetting about their respective revolutions – or we as Canadians being asked to forget about the depression, the two World Wars, battles like Vimy, Dieppe, Cassino, Juno Beach and the Battle of the Atlantic or the way in which the prairies have shaped life for ALL of Canada … It’s a nice idea, but it is a radical shift of thinking and understanding, that we aren’t eager to make.

Yet, here is Isaiah insisting we MUST forget about the past if we are to journey into God’s future …

So, in the Church, what is it that we need to forget, and for that matter, how do we even begin to forget?

Another commentary on the text notes - the tendency of the Church is to baptize our successes and to believe that if we can only duplicate the mechanics the end results will be the same …

There are people who still lament the passing of the tent evangelists, and who believe if only preachers preached like they used to, our churches would be filled. Perhaps this glorification of the past is keeping us from seeing the greater glory God wants to lead us to. Perhaps bigger isn’t better. This time perhaps it could be smaller … the challenge is to dream up a new vision, and to leave the past behind.

Those visions of what COULD be are the power of Isaiah’s metaphor of water pouring forth in abundance in the wilderness … In a dry, dead place – life will abound!! If only we stop looking back over our shoulders and pining for a past that was never as golden as we believe …

Think of our story as a community … what is the past that we must leave behind to embrace the path ahead?

A time when the Sunday School classes were SO big they had to delay the full union of Tilston Street United and Knox United for two years until arrangements to teach such a massive group of kids could be arranged.

Jean’s Junior choirs that filled the community with music, and touched many lives and left many memories …

CGIT groups, overflowing Sunday Schools, huge AOTS and UCW groups, a Choir filling the loft, Worship services that had the church FULL there are many different memories of the golden era of the past that we tell and retell - we all do it. It starts with a simple – “I remember when …” and we recall the moments of meaning from our past as a community of faith.

They ARE our stories. And the ARE very good stories. They are important stories. But when they prevent us from embracing the reality of the moment and moving in the future, they are stories that have out lived their usefulness. They are stories that become burdens and barriers, and they need to be abandoned and forgotten …

That’s Isaiah’s point in this. The Babylonians are pining for a time in the past – and it wasn’t even their past. It was the past of their parents and grandparents. And Isaiah says – “enough … leave the past behind and let’s be ready to envision a new story where water pours forth in the desert and where life is found in abundance in dry, dust and dead land … “

Isaiah’s is an invitation to see the world in a radical new way, and to live accordingly …

It’s an invitation that fits well with Paul’s message to the Church at Phillipi. Paul gives them his CV – his background: which tribe he fit into, what his qualifications are, what his lineage is and so on – then he says: “none of this matters. In Christ is it all simply rubbish.”

And we know what we do with rubbish? We throw it away.

In the face of – in experiencing and living the resurrection, the past is irrelevant …

And to share a secret with you – we ARE people of the Resurrection. You and I – all of us together are people of the resurrection who live by the transformative power of the resurrection in our lives.

We ARE people of the resurrection, and when we dare to live the resurrection all the stories and tales and memories of the past 105 years become nothing more than rubbish. We are to forget about them and experience NEW ways of being and doing … We are people of the resurrection – all things old have passed away. As people of the resurrection – can we follow Paul’s lead and abandon the past and embrace the reality of THIS moment instead and stop pining for what once was and instead deal with what IS???


Something wondrous is about to happen in our dry barren desert wilderness. Soon abundant waters and a profusion of life will be found where once there was only a dry trackless desert … That’s the core of our faith – the transformative power of the resurrection …

Even the Psalm reading today picks up that theme when it proclaims “those who go our weeping shall come home with shouts of joy.” This is not an idle promise of what MIGHT happen, or what MAY happen. This is a promise of faith. This is the promise of the resurrection.

Our calling – our ministry of faith – is to live out that understanding that through faith – through the resurrection – we will experience that kind of transformation and rivers WILL flow through the dry, dusty and dead places in our lives. That’s the message of the resurrection – it will happen. So not only trust in it – live believing and anticipating it …

That is perhaps why our Gospel reading is so hard to comprehend. We get hung up on the details around the money and the nard that Mary is lavishing on Jesus’ feet. We count the cost and miss the point.

What if Jesus never said – “the poor will always be with you …” but rather said – “I’m only hear for a little while, but the poor will always be with you …” so instead of extravagantly spending so much on me, find ways of spending it on the poor AS WELL.

In the face of God’s abundance, perhaps the lesson is about being generous with the poor TOO. Maybe Jesus wants us to stop fretting over the bottom line and the costs, and to start living lives of abundance because all that we have comes from God who has shared it quite generously, and our calling is to pass on that generosity.

One commentary I read noted – There is no place for misers in the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is about pouring out perfume and not counting the cost … The Kingdom of God is about unfettered care and generosity. Yes, the poor will always be with us – that’s why we need to be generous to them … It is only right and just. Stop counting the costs … is the call of faith in this story.

So, today, we stand like the Israelites, far from our home – having been exiled in our lives, facing many challenges … We are poised to write a new story … a story of care, a story of generosity, a story of boundless compassion, a story of limitless love … a story of unconditional grace …

It is a story that will be written only when we stop looking over our shoulders and pining for a past that was never as golden nor as wonderful as we may think. It is a story that will be written when we turn our faces to the future and with a fresh start, begin to journey into the unknown that lies ahead of us … when we begin to journey into the wilderness.

“Forget about the past,” cries Isaiah to the Israelites and to us, “forget about all of it and instead look to the future …”

If we dare, we will soon see waters pour forth in breathtaking abundance where once there was nothing but a dry trackless land … There will be life in abundance …

It may not be – no, it WILL not be what we expect or what we anticipate, or even what we want – and it will not bear any likeness to what once was … but it WILL be what God wants for us …

Our task is to heed the words of Isaiah, and in all things – forget about the past, and embrace the future … We need to let go and let God take over … and when we do, we will be washed away by the abundance of LIFE that God offers …
May it be so, thanks be to God …


OFFERING

OFFERTORY AND PRAYER OF DEDICATION

HYMN # 36 (green book) Teach Me, God, To Wonder

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE - THE LORD’S PRAYER (# 959 VU)
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil
for the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours, now and forever.

HYMN # 79 (vs 1 – 5) (green book) God, We Praise You for the Morning

COMMISSIONING AND BENEDICTION

SUNG RESPONSE: Choir – Now Unto Him

The worship has ended…the work of God’s people has just begun.
Go in peace.