BURTON JOYCE COMMUNITY CHURCH
In fellowship with
Nottingham North East Circuit The Methodist Church
Sunday 11th April 2021
Welcome to today’s act of worship, prepared by Deacon Jenny Jones. We continue to walk with the disciples as they discover that their Lord – our Lord - is alive.
Sin and death have not won.
Hymns from Songs of Fellowship (SoF)
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
I hope you could say the Easter Cry out loud with enthusiasm. Hopefully, you even shouted it. I know reading it from this page is not the same as saying it together in church, but at least at home, you do not have to think about what the person sitting next to you is doing. Shout it out loud. Fill the words with passion. Say it boldly, with your heart and voice full of joy.
With our hearts full of praise, let us sing together.
SoF 469: Praise to the holiest in the height
Let us pray
Eternal God, as we stop for a moment here in your presence, we get a glimpse of your eternity and we know our time on earth is in your hands. Only you know the hours, days and years. You were before time, you are here with us today, and you will be around long after everything has ceased to be. You are Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. And so, as we gather to worship you, open our hearts and senses to enter your reality, where our sorrows and tears, our wrongdoings and fears are taken from us in the name of your Son. Amen
Our bible reading comes from Luke 24: 13-35: The Walk to Emmaus
Before we reflect on the encounter with Jesus on the Road to Emmaus, let us prayerfully sing about our journey with God.
SoF 599: When we walk with the Lord
Today’s message
I, like many of you, have now had my first Covid Vaccine. I wonder how many of you looked away when the needle was about to go into your arm. None of us likes pain. In 2011, the NHS spent £442 million on painkillers. How often do we just pop a pill because we feel a headache coming on? We don’t like to think of others in pain either. Let’s be honest, most of us are afraid of the answers a friend who is suffering extreme pain, might give to the question of how they are really feeling, and happily accept a bland, ‘I’m okay, all things considered’.
As Christians, I think we have turned a blind eye to the pain Jesus endured for us during his arrest, trail and crucifixion. The beatings; carrying a cross across his torn flesh; nails holding him to the cross; hours in the heat of a Middle Eastern day exposed, dehydrated, lifting yourself on your tethered hands and feet to draw in one more breath, and then the next. Crucifixion was truly horrific.
When Jesus appeared to the other disciples, we know that the wounds on his hands, feet and side were still there. I imagine that when Jesus appeared on the Road to Emmaus he was completely disfigured and unrecognisable. His voice too may have been affected by his injuries. Is it any wonder that two of his distraught, distracted and disillusioned friends did not recognise him?
I find it comforting that Jesus didn’t immediately confront them with their lack of faith, but allowed them to express their hurt, ask questions and receive new insights. He gave them the opportunity to turn away from these events, but his presence drew them to offer him hospitality – food and rest.
It was in the blessing and breaking of the bread that they finally recognised him. As his disciples they had probably seen him perform those actions hundreds of times and suddenly the connection was made. The women weren’t crazy. Jesus was alive. Everything might be completely illogical – but Jesus was alive. And as that realisation came upon them Jesus vanished from their sight.
He vanished from their sight, but not from their hearts. They rushed back to Jerusalem to find that others had encountered the risen Jesus too. And from those exciting, extraordinary events, these men and women spread the Good News of Jesus Christ across the globe and two thousand years later, we and billions of others have loved and followed Jesus as our Lord and Saviour.
Imagine we are walking home from Arnold. A stranger comes up and joins our conversation. How do we react? With caution? Find an excuse to stop, let the stranger carry on. We might listen inattentively and check our mobile phone. What encounters with God have we missed in this way? What insights have we lost? What adventures, because we were afraid of the unknown?
We live in a disfigured, pain-filled, broken world and yet we encounter Jesus alongside us where we are. Jesus allows us to share our anguish; explore our doubts and questions; and tells us again the truths about himself, his father and divine love that saves us, surrounds us and heals us. Are we excited? Are our hearts burning that we have these experiences? Are we desperate to run seven miles back to tell our friends about the encounters we have had with Jesus?
Maybe, today is the day when we open our eyes once again to the living Christ; to welcome him back into our lives and, in our joy, introduce him to those we know and love. Jesus’ sacrifice was genuine and horrific, but he faced it for us, and for our salvation. If we play down the cost of that pain and that sacrifice, we will miss the enormity of what Jesus overcame to save us – you and me.
Hymn SoF 296: Jesus lives!
Our final prayers are a mixture of confession and prayers for ourselves. They are entitled, Perfectly Love, and were written by Walter Brueggermann.
We pray, as often as we meet, that we might ‘perfectly love you.” Indeed, we have been commanded from the beginning to love you with all our hearts, and all our souls, and all our minds and all our strength. We have pledged to love, in our prayers and in our baptism, our confirmation, with our best resolve. But we confess ... we love you imperfectly; we love you with a divided heart, with a thousand other loves that are more compelling, with reservations and passion withheld and devotion impaired. We confess that we do not, as we are, love you perfectly; we do not keep your commands; we do not order our lives by your purpose; we do not tilt towards you as our deepest affection. But we would .... we would love you more perfectly, by embracing your passion for neighbours, your ways of justice and peace, by honouring the world you made, all creatures great and small, by self-care that knows you as our creator.
Lead us past our shabby compromises and our cheap devotion; lead us into singleness of vision and purity of heart that we may answer back in love to your great love for us. Free us from idolatries and our habit of recalcitrance, tender our hearts, gentle our lips, open our hands, that we may turn towards you fully and towards your world unguardedly. Let us bask in your freedom to become fully yours and, so trusting, fully our own. We pray through the Lord Jesus who loved you singularly, perfectly, fully – to the end. Amen
Our final hymn reminds us that Jesus is alive and deserves our praise.
SoF 220: I know not why God’s wondrous grace
A Blessing
May the God who is your delight and joy bless you with life and growth,
embrace you with shelter and protection, and dance with you along life’s way, now and through all your days. Amen.
Burton Joyce Community Church
Worshipping while the church building is closed
Opportunities for worship on radio and television
Daily Service: Radio 4 at 9.45am only on LW / DAB / internet (NOT on FM)
Sunday worship: Radio 4 at 8.10am on Sunday morning on FM / DAB / internet
Choral evensong: Radio 3, Wednesday at 3.30pm, repeated Sunday at 3pm
Songs of Praise: BBC1 at 1.15pm* on Sunday afternoon (*times may vary)
Methodist Circuit
On Facebook and website: Nottingham North East Circuit
Phone-in services: 0115 671 3715 (calls are free)
URC Synod
On Facebook: URC East Midlands Synod / The Dales URC
St Andrews with Castle Gate. https://standrewswithcastlegate.org.uk
St Helen’s, Burton Joyce, Reverend Anna Alls
On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RevdAnna/videos/
Other online resources There are many excellent worship resources, e.g.:
All Souls, Langham Place: https://www.allsouls.org/
St Martins in the Field: https://stmartins.digital/
Central Hall, Westminster: https://methodist-central-hall.org.uk/
Sunday services for April 2021
Date in April | Gospel reading | Topic | Prepared by | Songs of Fellowship | One of the hymns from the service |
4 | John 20:1-18 | Easter Sunday | Moses Agyam | 2020 | See, what a morning |
11 | Luke 24:13-35 | The road to Emmaus | Jenny Jones | 599 | When we walk with the Lord |
18 | John 20:19-31 | Thomas | Helen Snowball | 6 | Alleluia, Alleluia |
25 | John 21 v1-14 | Peter | Yanyan Case | 147 | Great is thy faithfulness |
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