Worship
Service for June 25, 2023
Prelude
Announcements:
Call to Worship
L: In the beginning God created the heavens
and the earth.
P: Behold our God is a Creator.
L: In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God.
P: Behold our God is a Redeemer.
L: The earth was without form and void, and
darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over
the face of the waters.
P: Behold our God is a Holy Spirit.
L: Let us worship the God who is one in three,
three in one, who hears our brokenness and gathers up all our meanings.
Opening Hymn – For the Beauty of the Earth #473/182
Prayer of Confession
God of new life, we often say
that anyone who is in Christ is a new creation.
Yet when we consider our lives, we confess our failure to live in
Christ. You promised to be present with
us always, yet our fear for the future shows we do not trust in You. You love us with a great, eternal, and costly
love, yet our self-hatred shows that we have not opened ourselves to Your
love. You promise that where Your Spirit
is, there is freedom, yet the injustice within Your church shows that we have
not let You set us free. God, guide us
on the slow journey of growth. Free us
from our fears, our prejudice, and our self-hatred, that we may live in Christ
in the freedom of Your Spirit. (Silent
prayers are offered)
AMEN.
Assurance of Pardon
L: The Lord is gracious and full of
compassion, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all, and God’s tender
mercies are over all His works. The Lord
is near to all that call upon God’s holy name in truth. The Lord will also hear their cry and will
save them.
P: We are God’s forgiven people. Hallelujah!
Gloria Patri
Affirmation of Faith/Apostles’
Creed
I believe in God the Father
Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth; And in Jesus Christ His only Son our Lord;
who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under
Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hell; the
third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and sitteth on
the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence He shall come to judge
the quick and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Ghost,
the holy catholic Church; the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins; the
resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. AMEN
Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s
Prayer
Lord, we usually come to these
moments of prayer offering thanks for the blessings that have been lavished
upon us, and we seem to have little reluctance to ask for more. Today, O God, we pray for your help to become
as thankful for the trials that befall us as we are grateful for the times of
smooth sailing. As the refiner’s fire
has the capacity to purify impurities in the metal, so in hard times we have
been able to release those things which did not really belong in us. As character is revealed by hardship, so we
have seen ourselves most truly at some of the most difficult times of our lives
– discovering what was most sound about us and what needed more shape and
substance.
Today we
would be brave enough not to pray to be spared from trials and temptations, but
rather for the trust in you to weather those times and allow you to use them
for our good.
We also pray, O Lord, for our
loved ones and the storms of life that they must endure at this time. Give them courage and strength to stand the
tests and trials that have befallen them and allow us the opportunity to
support them and care for them. We
especially pray today for…
In the midst of the storms of
life that come, there is also a quiet that you provide. In this moment, allow us to enter that time
of stillness so that you can hear the beating of our hearts, the thoughts of
our minds and that we might also be able to hear you.
We pray, in the name of the
one who himself endured pain and suffering for our sake and taught us to pray
together saying… …Our Father who art in heaven,
Hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver
us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory, forever.
AMEN.
Hymn – How Great Thou Art #467/147
Scripture Reading(s):
Genesis
21:8-21
Matthew
10:24-39
Sermon – Price of a Sparrow
John Steinbeck, a
twentieth century author of great American literature such as; East of Eden, Of
Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath, etc… once wrote that, “Only God sees the
sparrow fall, but even God doesn’t do anything about it.”
Although he was one of
the Great American Novelists, I might argue with him here. Perhaps the purpose of Steinbeck’s comment
was to suggest that God is All-Seeing or All-Knowing but disinterested in the
affairs of God’s own creation. Over time
philosophers and theologians alike have grappled with this belief. There has certainly been a belief among some
that God set the events in place a long time ago and now just sits back and
watches but does not intervene. There has
also been a belief among others that God acts more like a puppet master
controlling each and every aspect of our lives.
It is the classic argument between pre-destination, where God is in control
of all that we do vs. free will, where we have the freedom to do anything we
wish. Where do you fall in this classic
discussion?
We can take the
tragedy of the recent Titan implosion that happened this past week which killed
all 5 people on board getting media attention minute by minute of the rescue
operation, or we can look at the migrant ship near Greece carrying 750 refugees
that sank killing at least 600 of them which got almost no assistance even from
the local Coast Guard and almost no media coverage or we can take any other
tragic event throughout history that affected millions or even just one person
and wonder about this very question. How
much is a life worth, (is it truly worth more than a sparrow), especially when
you compare these two tragedies in contrast to one another? The five billionaires on board the Titan, in
which valiant efforts were made to locate and rescue it or the destitute Pakistani,
Egyptian, Syrian, Afghan and Palestinian refugees looking for a better life
somewhere else, in which even the Greek Coast Guard stood by and did almost nothing
until the migrant boat sank and only then called a nearby superyacht to come
and assist in a rescue operation. There
are some conflicting reports about that, but still….5 billionaires vs. 750 destitute
refugees.
Does God, in fact, see
every sparrow that falls? Does God, in
fact, care about every sparrow that falls?
We might come to the conclusion, based on our Matthew passage that we
are of more value than any sparrow and therefore, God does see us when we fall. But does God, in fact, see us AND intervene or
do something when we fall? And does God
have a hierarchy of that rescue operation or intervening? And, one more question, if God doesn’t do it
all the time, why does God choose to sometimes act and intervene or sometimes
choose to do nothing?
These are tough
questions to ask and even tougher ones to answer facing a tragedy like Titan,
or the migrant ship carrying 750 refugees that sunk this week, or any other
tragic event.
I suppose one of the
best answers to these questions was given in a movie called Latter Days. A Mormon missionary, who questioned his own
belief system within the Mormon church, was confronted by a woman who just
learned the tragic news that her longtime companion had died. She was distraught over his death and asked
why God would allow such a thing to happen.
The young Mormon missionary asked her if she ever read the comic section
of the newspaper. Taken aback she said,
“no”. He explained, “Well, I used to
read them all the time and I’d put my face right up to all the colors in the
comics. Did you know that those pictures
are just made of tiny dots? And when you
are up close and personal to the picture all you see are the individually
colored dots, but not the picture they create.
It’s only when you move the paper away from you or step back that you
can see the wonderful picture and the beauty of the artist. I’m not sure if that helps, but it has helped
me understand God a little better.”
When I was looking at
this passage and the two tragic events unfolding this week, I couldn’t help but
draw contrasts between the two, the Titan and the migrant boat, and make comparisons
to this passage from scripture about the worth of a sparrow compared to that of
a human life. But the more I thought
about it, the more frustrated I became about the inequality there is on this
earth. About the rich vs the poor, about
the privileged vs those who have nothing, about the abundance and scarcity measured
in the cost of human life. It made me very
frustrated and I wondered if there really was an answer. Clearing my mind of all that, I tried to read
the scripture passage again and anew without any preconceived or prejudicial
ideas about it. In so doing, I realized
that the point of Jesus’ comments in Matthew were not to compare the worth of a
human life, which is so easy to do facing tragedies like these. His point was to not be afraid. That God does indeed see and know everything –
to the extent that even the hairs on your head are all numbered, that what is seemingly
covered will be uncovered, even those things that are done in secret will be
revealed. Therefore, we are to live a
bold life for God, for the pursuit of a full and abundant life. How can you even compare spending $250,000
for a seat to see, in person, the Titanic laying on the bottom of the sea for
the past 100 years or spending $6,000 for the chance to live in another country
seeking a better life. You can’t even
compare those two lives, the one lived before boarding the Titan and the one
lived before boarding the migrant boat, they are so far removed from one another. And you can’t compare the amount of money and
effort made to rescue the 5 people on board the Titan compared to the lack of
care given to the rescue of 750 refugees.
It’s not even humanly possible to comprehend that kind of
comparison. Every tragic event is still
a tragedy. Each and every one of us will,
one day, come to our own end. And Jesus’
point is to live our best lives, without fear.
Show Video of God Who
Sees
From our Biblical stories
today, does God see us and intervene?
Yes, I think God does, every time.
Perhaps it’s to show us a well with water in it, like for Hagar. But, perhaps, it is just to wrap himself
around us at the time of our fall…to bring us home.
Offertory –
Doxology –
Prayer of Dedication –
Closing Hymn – Jesus, the Very Thought of Thee
#310/89
Benediction –
You are of more value than many sparrows. Go, without fear, into the world and be bold
in your convictions, your truth, and your life.
Go in peace!
Postlude
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