It's October! Service for Sunday 4th October 2020

It's October! 

Service for Sunday 4th October 2020 

BURTON JOYCE COMMUNITY CHURCH

A short service for use at home: Sunday 4th October 2020 

Prepared for Burton Joyce Community Church by Phil Colbourn. Prayers adapted from A New Zealand Prayer Book. Spend a  short time with God as we share in this time of worship together. 

WELCOME

HYMN: Songs of Fellowship 234. 

Immortal, invisible, God only wise

PRAYER AND PRAISE

Let all creation bless the Lord: Praise & exalt our God for ever

Bless the Lord, you heavens: Praise & exalt our God for ever

Bless the Lord, all dwellers on the earth: Praise & exalt our God for ever

Bless the Lord, all servants of the Lord: Praise & exalt our God for ever. Amen

CONFESSION

God of all mercy, in that we have sinned and fallen short of your glory,

Both in our dealings with others and our dealings with you,

In what we have done and in what we have failed to do,

Forgive us all that is past and raise us to new life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen

HYMN: Songs of Fellowship 821. 

Into the darkness

READING: GENESIS 1: 1-5

Creation

REFLECTION

In one sense, Creation is just the beginning. But in another, it is everything! Many churches keep “Creation-tide” in September but keeping Creation-tide this month fits with our Harvest Festival which we will keep on October 18^th.

Whatever your view of Creation in Genesis, it is a powerful story and one that reveals a perceptive understanding of the world around us. Let’s look at these opening verses. The earth is empty, a wet, dark place. God’s spirit is hovering, or brooding, over the waters. In contemporary cosmological terms, the Big Bang is behind us and we are suspended in that moment when we don’t know what will happen next (so a wet, dark earth may be a bit premature) but wait: 

“Orchestra! Lights! Beginners!” God speaks and the play begins!

Pause a moment: 

Electromagnetic energy, subatomic particles, quarks, bosons, photons, galaxies, star systems & planets spring out of the imagination of God. 

Be amazed! This is only the beginning. The stuff of dreams. 

Pause. Let there be light!

For Christians, of course, Jesus is both the Word of God – the speaking – and the Light of the World – the spoken, and it is through Jesus that we come to God. God speaks Jesus into our lives and new creation begins. 

It is perhaps too easy for us to reach for a set of “spiritual” answers and to think we know what it all means but, I wonder, if Jesus is the Light, what does that tell us about God?

Thou whose almighty word chaos and darkness heard and took their flight… Move on the waters’ face bearing the lamp of grace and in earth’s darkest place: Let there be Light! 

Beware, chaos and darkness! God speaks! 

God says: “Let there be Jesus!” and there is Light! 

God sees and it is good. 

Let's spend a few moments absorbing the enormity of it all. Allow the reality of Creation to expand and enlarge our vision of God and our grasp on what our faith might mean in the here and now. 

Creator of Light, let the new day of Jesus dawn in our lives. Amen.

HYMN: Songs of Fellowship 393. 

Morning has broken

INTERCESSORY PRAYERS 

We pray 

For the hungry and the overfed

For the mourners and the mockers

For the victims and the oppressors

For the peacemakers and the warmongers

For the unemployed and the overworked

For the weak and the strong

We pray for ourselves and the people and situations on our hearts 

May truth & love lead us together in harmony and peace. Amen

 

Finally, we say The Lord’s Prayer: Our Father 

HYMN: Songs of Fellowship 1200. 

Christ whose glory fills the skies

CLOSING PRAYERS 

In darkness & in light, in trouble & in joy, help us, Heavenly Father, to trust your love, serve your purpose & praise your name, through Jesus our Lord. Amen.

May the blessing of our God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, rest upon us and remain with us, and with all we love & long for, this day and for ever. Amen.