We will celebrate Communion at both churches today.
Worship
Service for December 3, 2023
Prelude
Announcements:
Call to Worship
L: In those days, before the final coming of
Christ in glory, there will be mighty signs.
P: They will be seen in the heavens and on
earth.
L: They will remind us of God’s eternal
presence and power.
P: We will all be changed in the twinkling of
an eye.
L: Therefore, let our hearts be glad and our
souls rejoice!
P: God has reached out to all God’s people
with compassion and tender mercy.
All: AMEN!
Lighting of the Advent Candles
L: Hope is assertive, even aggressive at
times. Hope fueled the prophet to call
upon God to tear open the heavens and shake the mountains so that we would all
tremble, remembering that there is a God, because the world has forgotten. But we have not. We cling to this hope that interrupts and
shakes our lives out of monotony, out of complacency, and out of despair. We light this candle, a spark of flame that
ignites a rebellion of hope against empire, against hate, against fear. This is the fire that kindles inside of us
and will not die.
Join me in praying:
God of Hope, our world
has grown cold with despair, with hopelessness, with weariness and dread. Alight in us the fire of Your Spirit, a
reminder that death never has the final word, so we might pursue justice and live
into Your ways and become living hope in a world that desperately needs
it. AMEN.
Opening Hymn – Angels from the Realms of Glory #22/259
Prayer of Confession
We cry, “Make it easy for us
to figure out,” as we seek signs of God’s presence. We want it simple. Just tell us and we can take the proper
precautions. There are signs all around
of God’s presence among us – both in that which has been created and in the
newness of creation of everyday living.
We’re looking for signs of gloom and doom – but we should be looking for
signs of hope and triumph. Forgive us,
merciful God, when we spend so much time looking for the scary things in
life. Focus our attention on ways in
which we can be of service with whatever time we have. Forgive us when we seek the darkness of anger
and fear and turn our backs on the light of possibilities and peace. Open our hearts once again to your redeeming
love and transforming peace, for we ask these things in Jesus’ name. (Silent prayers are offered) AMEN.
Assurance of Pardon
L: In Christ we are made new. We are healed and forgiven, we are challenged
and guided to become those who work for the better rather than those who would
destroy and damage.
P: You call us Your people, O God, and we are
eternally grateful.
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
Almighty and merciful
God we believe, despite all the strange coming and goings of humanity, that our
history belongs to you. We give thanks
that your eternal purpose is weaving its way through the events of time and
space. Sometimes, O Lord, it’s a
challenge to hold on to this belief, but our confidence is in Christ, your Son
and our Savior. We believe his death and
resurrection are our confirmation that even though we can’t understand the big
picture of things, we can know history’s final outcome. Gracious God, we watch with eager expectation
for the return of Christ. Our souls buzz
with anticipation of seeing the One, face to face, who authored and sustains
the universe, the One in whom and through whom all things hold together, the
One who will one day sit in judgment. We
believe that on that last and great day all of history’s scoffers will drop to
their knees in recognition of your Son.
In this season when the darkness is banished and the light
has come, we look to you for comfort and strength. We hand over to you the concerns of our
hearts and pray for….
Not only these do we pray for, but we also pray for the
burdens that are too difficult to share…hear us, Lord, in this time of silence.
With hearts of endless joy we pray to you this morning, the
prayer that your Son 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 – Let
All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence Hymn
#5 Blue
Scripture Reading(s):
First Scripture Reading – Isaiah
64:1-9
Second Scripture Reading – Mark
13:24-37
Sermon – “Come on Down”
One of the longest
enduring game shows on television is The Price Is Right. On the show the announcer says someone’s name
and then shouts, “Come on Down!” Like
the announcer on The Price is Right, Isaiah, in our Old Testament reading
pretty much does the same thing and prays, "Hey, God, come on down!" But is that what we really want, for God to
come down from heaven? Perhaps not when
we read what will happen shortly before God comes. I think we would prefer for God to be safely
tucked away up in heaven and things down here on earth in everyday life to just
float along. Instead, Isaiah prays: O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so
that the mountains would quake at your presence— as when fire kindles brushwood
and the fire causes water to boil— to make your name known to your adversaries,
so that the nations might tremble at your presence!
Jesus repeats the
theme in our reading in Mark, “But in those days, after that suffering, the sun
will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be
falling from heaven.” We don’t really want
that, do we? We want the safety of God
in the Bette Midler song "From a Distance." But then there are times, deep in our hearts,
when we really do want God to come on down so God will know what life is like. So that God can understand our suffering, our
pain, our struggles. So that God can
really wrap His arms around us when we feel lost and alone. And so with the prophet Isaiah, when we feel miserable
and abandoned, we cry out, "Hey, God, come on down!"
Well, the good news is
that God already came down. That's what
this season of Advent and Christmas is all about: the day God came down to be
one of us.
Grandpa found his
grandson jumping up and down in his playpen, crying at the top of his voice. When Johnnie saw Grandpa, he reached out his
chubby little hands and said, "Out, Grampa, out." Grandpa reached down to lift his grandson out
of his predicament, but as he did, Johnnie's mom stepped up and said, "No,
Johnnie, you are on time out for bad behavior. You have to stay in your playpen." Grandpa didn't know what to do. His grandson's tears reached deep into his
heart. Yet, Mom's firmness couldn't be
taken lightly. Grandpa couldn’t take his
grandson out of the playpen; so, instead he climbed in with the little boy. Love found a way.
That is exactly what
Jesus did for us at Christmas. Christ
left heaven for earth and climbed in with us. God came down. The Word was made flesh. God in Christ moved in next door. God did tear open the heavens, not in the
mighty way we expected, but when the angelic chorus burst forth in song at the
birth, all heaven broke loose to sing for the shepherds. A star fell from the sky to mark a pathway so that
men from the east could follow. Although
there was no room, an innkeeper’s soul was shaken and he found the couple, heavy
with child, a safe place, in a cattle stall to welcome the Christ Child into a
manger. We said we didn't want it, but
we were wrong.
800 years after Isaiah
prayed to God for God to come down and show the people, God came down and
walked as one of us. God came down and,
through an infant, said "I love you."
Everything has a
genesis—a beginning, a starting point. Life
began somewhere in the murky past. We
know little of its history except for the broad strokes that the Bible paints
for us. Scientists of various
disciplines have filled in the finer lines, but still a lot of it is out of
focus. The one thought we know is that
"in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" How, what, when, where, and why, might be a
bit uncertain. But we know from
Scripture that our beginning started when God made the heavens and the earth.
But just as everything
has a beginning, it also has an ending. One
day the world will have to deal with the end. Our text in Mark deals specifically with the
truth concerning the end. And the truth
of it is that we don’t know how, what, when, where, or why that time will come. We might recognize the seasons, but it’s
going to come like a thief in the night or like a landowner who suddenly comes
home from a long journey.
If you’ve ever read a mystery
or thriller novel or gone to see one at the theaters, endings are sometimes kind
of scary. You never know what might
happen. Or a completely different way to
look at it comes from one of my favorite lines from a movie, Hope Floats. “Beginnings are scary, endings are usually sad, but it is
the middle that counts the most. You need to remember that when
you find yourself at the beginning, just give hope a chance to float up.”
As Christians we don’t
get stuck on worrying about the ending.
Instead, we celebrate the beginning of when God walked among us in Christ
during this Advent and Christmas Season.
The rest of the time we celebrate Hope and live into the present, the
middle time period, the one that counts the most. And Christ in the Gospel according to Mark
tells us what we should be doing during this time period. While the master is on his journey, we should
stay vigilant because God has a plan for us.
And God's plan for us right
now includes the following: You can
remember it simply by remembering the word PLAN and the letters in that
word. P-L-A-N.
P-Purpose, L-Leadership,
A-Achievement and N-Nurture.
Purpose. All of us together and each of us as
individuals should be working toward an action, an aim, or a design that God
desires for our lives.
Leadership. We should be following God's leadership, not
leading God!
Achievement. Being successful means reaching the goals God
has for us, not what we want for our own desires.
Nurture. Being educated and trained by God in the truths
of being a follower of Christ.
Isaiah prayed to God 800
years before Christ came, “O that you would tear open the heavens and come
down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence— as when fire kindles
brushwood and the fire causes water to boil— to make your name known to your
adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence!”
It didn’t quite happen
that way. Mark writes the same thing and
writes that Jesus said to be prepared and to watch. He even says that “this generation will not
pass away until these things have come to pass.” So, it probably won’t happen exactly the way
we’ve interpreted it to happen either.
All we really know is that Love found a way in a young couple with
shepherds and angels, wisemen and a star.
Love will find a way again.
God came down and He
will come again. As Christians, we
should not be so concerned with the world's priorities that we lose sight that
this world is not our permanent home. The
truth is that one day, Jesus is coming back to gather his people home. During the waiting – have you followed the
plan - PLAN? Are you ready?
Offertory –
Doxology –
Prayer of Dedication –
Eternal
God, how majestic is your name in all the earth. The whole earth is full of your glory. Please accept our humble offerings of
ourselves and our resources. Please use
them to herald your hope to all persons everywhere who are living in physical,
moral, and spiritual poverty. Bless our
gifts this day, O Lord. AMEN.
Communion
Invitation
In coming to the Lord’s Table,
we intentionally take our place in the story. We come not on our own, or only
as this congregation, but with the Body of Christ throughout the world and the
saints in heaven. We come as real
people, loved for all our real or perceived faults. We come as those who are an essential part of
the story, because there is room for everyone in this story. We also come to the Lord’s Table as those
invited. Our welcome does not depend on
how good we are. It does not depend on
whether we feel like we are worthy or not. It is an open invitation to all, as a gift of
great joy for all people.
The Lord Jesus on the night of
his arrest, took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and
said, “This is my body that is for you.
Do this in remembrance of me.”
Christ’s body was broken that
we might be made whole. Take and eat.
In the same way he took the
cup also, after supper, saying, “This is the cup of the new covenant in my
blood. Do this, as often as you drink
it, in remembrance of me.” For as often
as you eat this bread and drink the cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he
comes again.
Christ’s blood was shed that
we might be healed. Take and drink.
Prayer After Communion
Holy God, from generation to
generation, we are nurtured at Your banquet feast. As we once again tell Your story of
forgiveness and love, we proclaim our adoption into Your family tree of kings,
carpenters, foreigners, disregarded women, and second sons. May our lives testify that there is a place
for everyone in Your story of salvation. Amen.
Closing
Hymn – What Child is This? Hymn #53/281
Benediction –
Dance,
celebrate, sing, and shout for joy while we wait for Christ’s return. He already goes before us into this world of
fear and pain. He has called us to bring
the Good News of healing and hope, and of redemption. Go in peace, and feel the
presence of the Risen Lord with you, now and forever. AMEN.
Postlude
