Worship
for the Lord’s Day
February
21, 2021
A Note before we begin
this day’s worship:
We are currently at 5.4% positivity rate, a whole point
lower than last week, so I’m pretty confident that we’ll be back to in-person
worship soon. I know that more and more
of us are getting vaccinated and we’ll continue to use safe distancing
practices and other safeguards. For now,
we remain on-line only but our sessions meet again on Tuesday, Feb 23rd. We’re hoping to re-open for worship on Palm
Sunday or Easter Sunday. We’ll let you
know, so stayed tuned.
Our music, for the next few weeks, will be YouTube clips as
I had done before our current organist was recording music.
Let’s begin:
Prelude Toccato and Fugue in D Minor for Flute
Call to Worship
Holy God, there are
some journeys for which we long, but the journey to the cross looks as though
it will be difficult to bear. We know
that discipleship and faith are difficult, too.
We would prefer something easier.
We are not really ready for this trip.
As we worship today, Lord, put our minds at ease, for we know that we do
not travel alone. AMEN.
Hymn Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart
Prayer of Confession
We have lists of things
to do, for all the areas of our lives.
Our lives are so time bound and duty bound that we feel imprisoned in
them. Now we are challenged by Christ to
take a journey of discipleship. We don’t
feel ready for this journey. We need more
time. Even in these Covid-19 days of
isolation, we find it necessary to complain and cry about how much we have to
do. Forgive us, Lord, when we place so
many “duties” in the path of serving You.
Reset our priorities so that we will be ready to commit our lives in
Your service. Lord, help us to be ready
when you call us. Help us to
courageously answer the summons You bring.
Let us place our trust in You in all things. AMEN
Words of Assurance
God is merciful and
full of everlasting love. God will not
forget us. God will wash us clean, and
lead us on paths of steadfast love and faithfulness. AMEN
Affirmation of Faith – from A Brief Statement
of Faith.
We trust in Jesus
Christ, fully human, fully God.
Jesus proclaimed the
reign of God:
preaching good news to
the poor and release to the captives,
teaching by word and
deed and blessing children,
healing the sick and
binding up the brokenhearted,
eating with outcasts,
forgiving sinners,
and calling all to
repent and believe the gospel.
Unjustly condemned for
blasphemy and sedition,
Jesus was crucified,
suffering the depths of
human pain
and giving his life for
the sins of the world.
God raised this Jesus
from the dead,
vindicating his sinless
life,
breaking the power of
sin and evil,
delivering us from
death to life eternal.
With believers in every
time and place,
we rejoice that nothing
in life or in death
can separate us from
the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
Alleluia. Amen.
Pastoral Prayer
Loving and Creating God, you are in covenant with Your
people. You have pledged to be our God
and ask us to be Your people, trusting in You in all our ways. But we find many excuses to prevent us from
really trusting You. We erect barriers
before our faith journey even begins.
Our time, obligations, energy, all become part of the bricks and mortar
which fashion this barrier. We can give
lip service to the journey; we can daydream about what it would be like to
truly place our hands in Yours and follow You.
But when it comes to actually making the journey, our time constraints
and weak commitments loom largely before us.
Help us tear down this barrier.
Make us ready for the journey by replacing the fear in our hearts with a
sense of joy and challenge of self-discovery and discipleship. Remind us that in service to You, helping
others, we will also find ourselves made more fully whole.
This day, we offer up
in prayer…
Let us remember that
we, too, stand in need of prayer and healing.
Make us ready to receive Your good news and then be witnesses to Your
love to all Your people.
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 Open My Eyes
Scripture Readings
Old Testament: Genesis
9:8-17
8Then God said to Noah and to
his sons with him, 9“As for me, I am establishing
my covenant with you and your descendants after you, 10and
with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals,
and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. 11I
establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by
the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the
earth.”
12God said, “This is the sign of
the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is
with you, for all future generations: 13I have
set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and
the earth. 14When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the
clouds, 15I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every
living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood
to destroy all flesh. 16When
the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant
between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” 17God
said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between
me and all flesh that is on the earth.”
New Testament: Mark 1:9-15
9In those days Jesus came from
Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10And
just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and
the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11And a
voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well
pleased.” 12And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the
wilderness. 13He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he
was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
14Now after John was arrested,
Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15and
saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent,
and believe in the good news.”
Sermon
– Lent
Begins
(based on Genesis 9:8-17, Mark
1:9-15)
If you are a member
of one of my congregations, you’ve probably already received a packet for
Lent. This packet was inspired by a book
that I purchased over 30 years ago called Journey to Jerusalem. Back then I was serving as an Associate
Pastor at First Presbyterian of Edgewood and we used the book to shape an
all-church retreat that we held near Ligonier.
Over the years I have wanted to revisit this extraordinary journey
through the Holy Lands of Christ and his life.
At some point last year, when I realized that we would probably not be
back to in-person worship during this Lenten season, I began looking for my
copy of this book to see what I could re-create again as a take home
packet. I searched everywhere, but
couldn’t find my copy. With only the
Title to go by and a clear vision of the cover of the book, but no author’s
name, I first searched on-line for a new copy of the book, but came up
empty-handed. Then I reached out to
social media’s collective mind to see if anyone else had remembered this book,
knew which one I was referring to and, more importantly, if they had a
copy. Evidently, there are many books by
that title and although I got lots of helpful suggestions none of them were
correct. Until my friend, Vivian, sent
me a text message saying, “I found it.”
And, indeed, she had at a used bookstore somewhere in Alabama that had
an online catalogue of their inventory.
I ordered it
immediately and was delighted when it arrived.
But 30 years is a long time to misremember the contents of a book. To the book’s credit for the impact it made
on me 30 years ago, much of it was exactly as I remembered it, but my
re-remembering of the book over those 30 years had given it somewhat of a
different shape.
So, the packet that
you’ve received is a combination of what I found most exciting about the book
and my own vision of this journey we are going to take during Lent 2021. Lent is always a journey. It has its roots when we begin to celebrate
the coming of the Lord in Advent, but really takes off after Jesus was
baptized, when the Holy Spirit of God drove Jesus out into the wilderness to begin
his own journey of ministry and mission.
This week, Lent begins. It
is a time for us to deeply contemplate our own season of trial and temptation,
of our purpose and our own ministries.
So, I hope you join me on this journey with Christ as he moves about the
countryside of Judea, enters several small villages to heal and teach, and
ultimately winds his way to the Cross and the Tomb, places destined for him
alone.
Each stop along the way has a brochure which is full of helpful
historical information that ties Jesus to place and time and his own
discoveries there. What is wonderful
about the 21st Century is our ability to travel via the internet to
places and times all over the world, so please take advantage of the websites
and YouTube clips included in each brochure to gain a fuller appreciation for
the journey that Jesus took.
Our scripture passages this week for our time of worship this
Sunday include the story of God’s promise to Noah after the flood, which
affected the whole earth and devastated all living things upon the earth. Is there a correlation that we can make for
today’s pandemic? Is there a promise of
hope after we’ve witnessed the death, so far, of 2.5 million people around the
world from this virus? We might wonder,
what was the “mood” after the flood? In
Genesis God promises never again to flood the earth – but what about other
natural disasters, like our current pandemic, do they count just a little? The flood itself, and the covenant God makes
here, remind us that God’s redemption isn’t merely human souls but all creatures,
all of creation. St. Francis understood
our kinship with his brothers and sisters, the birds, fish, wolves, cattle,
flowers, and trees, and sang it in his Canticle and enacted it by preaching to
creatures. Perhaps, these things, such
as pandemics, serve as a wake up call to us – to care more fully and more
completely for God’s whole creation, for all of God’s creatures, human and
otherwise.
The rainbow God sends after the flood, is an opening, I suspect
for us to talk about signs. We love
signs that show us clearly what to believe, which decision to make, how to
gather our thoughts – but we don’t always see the right signs and
interpret them correctly. Seeing a
rainbow is a lovely reminder of God’s ultimate mercy. But so are the trees, flowers, and birds, as
Jesus pointed out in the Sermon on the Mount.
So too, are the connections we have with one another, the faces of our
friends and loved ones, and even the faces of strangers walking by us on the
street, the unknown faces of the world around us. They are all signs of God’s magnificent
benevolence and love.
Turning to our Mark passage, we move from God’s promise for all
creation to a more personal promise or blessing. Notice in Mark that the blessing comes
directly to Christ, it is second-person speech: not “this is my beloved,” but
rather “You are my beloved.” I like
that. It’s personal. In this journey of Lent, God made a promise
to all of creation, but God makes a personal promise at Christ’s baptism. You.
You are my beloved. God invites
us to be Jesus’ Body and hear God say directly to us, “You – yes, You! – are my
beloved.” God not only cares about the
creation as a whole entity, he cares about the individual creature, too. God cares about you. You are God’s beloved. Knowing that we are loved helps us on a
journey that can lead us into the unknown, that might lead us to scary places,
that might lead us to places we’d rather not go. Just like Christ, before he began his
journey, God reached out and said to him.
You, are my beloved. Also saying,
in that promise and blessing, “There is nothing to fear. I am always with you.”
Within that lovely promise there is a bit of anxiousness, as
well. For, also in Mark, notice the
vivid "the heavens were torn apart" in Mark 1:10. Donald Juel, professor of New Testament
Theology at Princeton, reflected on this and observed that "what is opened
may be closed again; what is torn apart cannot easily return to its former
state." I believe Mark writes it
this way on purpose, so that we don’t become too complacent in our knowledge
that we are the Beloved. We shouldn’t
relax. There is work to be done. We can’t go back to the way things were. We are on a journey and journey’s, regardless
of their route, always lead forward, not back.
They might be a journey of remembrance to places we once lived or worked
or visited, but they, even then, are in the present and the future. We can never return to the past.
Then the Spirit “immediately” (remember what I said about Mark
before - Jesus is always in a hurry, everything in Mark is urgent)…Then the
Spirit “immediately drove him out into the wilderness.” We have our marching orders, so to
speak. We cannot rest. We are on a journey and the journey is
beckoning us forward. The wilderness, in
Mark, could be seen as the challenges we all face. This pandemic season might feel like a
wilderness. But it’s a place, a zone, a
time of testing. Jesus was driven out,
but he also chose to let himself be driven.
What would it mean for us, to see ourselves as driven into a time of
testing, purifying the self, shedding the crutches we’ve relied on, and relying
for a time only on God?
It’s interesting to notice that in Mark, he doesn’t do the three
boxing rounds of temptation with the devil that we find in Matthew and
Luke. Here, he’s “with the wild
beasts.” It sounds scary, maybe scarier
than verbal jousting with the devil.
Leap off the temple? It’s easy to
say no to that one. But a couple of
bears growling and drooling behind us, or some predator lying in wait to pounce
upon us? These things are the terrors of
the night. These things awake us from
our slumber and leave us breathless and anxious. What are the things that terrify you? The only way to survive such assaults of
doubts or self-recrimination or anxiety or grief or a restless night is the
remembering of the Baptism, of being Beloved.
Did you know that when Martin Luther faced moments of doubt and
restlessness, he calmly resisted by saying, “I am baptized”?
And finally in this text from Mark, in Christ’s beginning journey,
“The angels waited on him.” The verb
“wait” is always theologically suggestive.
We “wait” on the Lord, as in it takes time, watching, expecting, not
there yet, but coming. Did the angels
wait on Christ in this way?
We also “wait” on the Lord, as in the way a waiter waits on a
table, serving, hosting, helping. What
waiting service did the angels provide to Jesus? Not food, because he was fasting,
remember! Did they wipe his brow? Did they sing him songs, choral anthems of
encouragement and inspiration?
What angels will assist you on your journey? What service will they provide? Remember you are the Beloved and you do not
go on this journey alone.
Join me on this new journey for Lent in 2021. Where will it lead us?
Hymn Amazing Grace
Benediction
The first step on any
journey is that of readiness, but it is one of the hardest. We keep thinking that we have forgotten
something. God has called you by name,
to this journey. You will have all that
you need. Go in peace, and know that God
is going with you. AMEN.
Postlude Fugue in G minor
