What do we bring to our worship?

Trinity 8 - Sunday, 2nd August, 2009

John 6.24-35

So, what do we bring to our worship? At the service we had brought a lot - 2 children for baptism, a couple celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary. We bring all that we are, which is based on our history - our history as the church both our own and the church worldwide. We bring ourselves and with that come our joys, griefs and sorrows. We bring with us all those that are around us, all those whom we care about.

How we bring all these things affects how we worship. How we come, how prepared we are makes a difference to the experience that we will have. Have we looked over the week just past, its highs and lows, gifts and difficulties, encouragements and disappointments, joys and sad points? Following from our thoughts about the week, have we considered our prayers, what we want to bring to God in the intercessions? What do we want to thank Him for and what do we want to ask about? Have we looked at the readings for the service? Have we read them and thought carefully about them?

There are also the practical things that we do to prepare for our worship on Sunday; arranging the flowers, producing the service sheet, selecting and preparing the music. These actions are key parts to our worship too.

There are many different ways to prepare but the following two points are important:

• That we do prepare - wholeheartedly and thoroughly, taking time out of our busy week to prepare adequately for worship
• That we find our own way of doing it. It's the only way we will keep at it, if we find the best way that suits ourselves

If we are prepared we will be ready to meet Jesus during our worship.

Tomatoes in fruit salads - knowledge vs wisdom

Trinity 7 - Sunday, 26th July, 2009

Job 19.1-27a

Psalm 74.11-16

Luke 11.1-13

The reading in Job contains one of the high spots of the book - God will vindicate. The reader knows, although Job doesn't, that his misfortune is a result of a conversation between God and Satan. God maintained Job was blameless and upright but Satan said this was because God had been so good to him. Satan challenged God to put him under test by allowing Satan to destroy everything Job had. This did not make Job falter so Satan challenged God further by saying, "touch him and he'll curse you". God then allowed Satan to torment Job himself.

In chapter 42 Job's faithfulness is rewarded, he dies an old man with a healthy family. Even before that point Job maintains he is a righteousness man. His friends, however, are convinced that what has happened Job is due to sin. Job says, "I shall see God on my side". What faith!

God doesn't explain to Job why it is happening. Job simply admits that he's out of his depth in trying to understand God. His wisdom encourages him onwards, following a righteous life.

It's important to distinguish between knowledge and wisdom. One secular parallel situation is that knowledge informs us that a tomato is a fruit but wisdom helps to ensure we don't add one to a fruit salad.

Knowledge teaches us skills like warfare, how to build the middle east, and genetic modification. However, wisdom should define how and where these skills are used.

Wisdom (an example of its use - Abolition of Slavery) draws on previous generations' wisdom and applies this to what we know it is to be human. It is a gift from God and thus we need to develop a disposition to put God in the centre of our lives.

It will always be a struggle to understand and be able to explain the world. We may not understand what goes on around us but God does move in mysterious ways.

Who's your hero?

Trinity 7 - Sunday, 26th July, 2009

2 Samuel 11.1-15

Psalm 14

Ephesians 3.14-21

John 6.1-21

When we think of our heroes we seem to have too much trust in them (or get too excited) and then they disappoint us. For example, in sport, Stirling Moss was caught speeding; in politics JFK. Taking it further: we eventually discover that Dad doesn't know everything and isn't everywhere, or that Mum doesn't always know what's hurting us so much.

The psalmist fails very badly in the 2 Samuel passage. He succumbs to the temptations of a very beautiful woman and then tries to cover it up by getting her husband to sleep with her. To make matters worse, when this doesn't work he gets her husband killed - a man who was a very loyal servant to David.

How David's conscience caught up with him is reserved for next week's reading. Our heroes - we think they have every skill. For ourselves, getting too proud of ourselves is the basis of weakness.

In the gospel reading Jesus feeds a huge crowd from a handful of food and the crowd got far too excited. They were going to make him king and he had to withdraw by himself. We know it was a large crowd too!

Mark's gospel contrasts the banquet that Jesus provided with Herod's banquet where John the baptist was killed. Both show types of kingship. The following table shows the contrasts between the two events.

	Jesus	Herod
Motivation	Guest's spiritual and physical welfare	Impressing guests
Guests	Weak, poor	Wealthy, influential
Where?	Seated on grass	Comfortably in a palace
Outcome	Healing	Head of John the baptist

Jesus gives his own life, he doesn't take others. Foolish and wicked people killed him and God raised him from the dead for us. We have a king completely worthy of our worship and love - who we can't get too excited about!

Blessings of God

Trinity 6 - Sunday, 19th July, 2009

2 Samuel 7.1-14a

Psalm 89:20-37

Ephesians 2.11-22

Mark 6.30-34, 53-56

The readings focus on the blessings of God. 2 Samuel mentions the house that God will give to David. He is not given a normal house, he is given a household, a dynasty, generations, a line, a lasting throne. It's through David and his family that God's people are given His blessing.

David and his sons didn't meet God's demands and so the kingdom failed. The Psalm, however, states that God's promise still stands even though God's people have failed.

Ephesians tells us that God's promises have been fulfilled. Jesus has made the difference (a son of David). The promise that we're with God forever is fulfilled in the good news of the gospel. Here and now we celebrate His mercies and we receive the blessings (in communion).

The gospel (Mark 6) is a 'film strip' showing us Jesus doing it in real time - giving us the blessings of God through healing. Jesus brought us health - eternal health.