Sunday 17th October 2021

 BURTON JOYCE 

COMMUNITY CHURCH

In association with  

17 October 2021

A service written by Rev David Speed and adapted for Burton Joyce Community Church by Phil Colbourn. 

Hymns in Songs of Fellowship (SoF)

We invite you to spend a few moments with God, knowing that other people are sharing in this act of worship with you. We hope that you find this service helpful. 

Call to Worship 

Blessed be the Lord our God for He has come to set his people free 

Hymn SoF 1583 We have a gospel to proclaim 

Prayer 

Lord, your wonder streams from sun and star, you are at the heart of everything in all creation, and yet near to each loving heart. We praise you for your graciousness, and your love. 

We are only sorry for the many times we have failed to live up to them and you. Your love and your ways are so much greater than ours. 

Please, forgive us our failings. Help us to start again, and believe that you are with us, and in us, to make it possible that we can become more like you.  

Amen

We pray the Lord’s Prayer together

Reading - Psalm 51: 10-17 

Hymn SoF 278 I will sing the wondrous story 

Sermon – Worship: Offering of the heart

The theme for today is worship. Someone once wrote a book describing Methodism as ‘The Music of the Heart’. I would like to suggest that worship is the Offering of the Heart.

What makes up a human being? Hands, feet, ears, heart, mind, imagination, love. You’ll have your own ideas. Some of us are thinkers, some of us are doers, some of us tend to feel with the heart. Others of us tend to think with the mind. 

Whichever it is, we can bring it to our worship. 

How do you feel about worship? ‘I’m always glad to be here with my friends’. Or you might say, ‘It depends on who’s preaching. It depends how I feel’. Or you may feel that you’re not very good at worshipping. 

You don’t have to be. Whatever you have, you can bring to your worship, so long as we use it not to show off but to show God. 

Long before the National Health Service, the only place where you could be treated if you were severely ill was the monastery. Do you remember the story of the juggler, who fell seriously ill, and the only place and who was treated at the monastery? The monks, after some time, nursed him back to health. He had no money and did not know what to do to say, ‘thank you’. Eventually, he went to the Chapel, and began juggling. A monk was passing by and was shocked. He ran to the Abbot and explained what was happening. The Abbot went to the Chapel, saw what was going on and made up his own mind. “Leave him alone”, he said, “He has done what he could”. 

If hands used to juggle can be used to worship, what else can they be used for? Praying, playing, painting, presenting the offering, giving and receiving from God. How can the feet be used? How can the ears be used? How can the mind be used? What about the imagination? All you and I have can be offered to God in worship. All that matters is that it comes from the heart. 

The first British Christians used to talk about the ‘seven-stringed harp’. All our skills can be used to worship God. Even the thing that we’re not good at can be offered. You may not be of Katharine Jenkins or Bryn Terfel. Does that mean that your voice should not be used in worship? 

An invading Army burnt down a monastery. Three old monks escaped and lived in the forest. They found a beautiful glade, which they called their cathedral. Each day they worshipped God. Their voices were old and cracked and the only song they sang was the Magnificat. They sang this each evening until one day a stranger with a beautiful voice joined them, and they stopped singing. 

After a while, an angel appeared and said, “The Lord wishes to know why there is no praise now sent up to Him”. “But there is. Has the Lord not heard this man’s beautiful singing – far finer than ours could ever be?” 

The angel said, “Yes, it is beautiful, but that man does not sing to praise the Lord but for the pleasure of hearing his own voice. The Lord wishes you to start singing again”. 

A very young child gives you a picture that she has painted. It’s not very good, though it might raise £50,000 in the Tate Gallery. She is giving you the best she has as a gift of love. In the same way, we offer worship to God. We may do things like that and the Lord receives them gladly because it is our gift and comes from the heart. 

Henry Olonga was a Zimbabwean cricketer who fell foul of Robert Mugabe’s regime. He was almost too talented. He was a cricketer and he was also a singer who could write his own songs. One of them was about how, as a little boy, he brought weeds from the garden to give to his mother, and how she received them as if they were the best gift ever. In the same way, our Heavenly Parent receives our gifts of love. 

An offering from the heart will mean giving God the best we have to offer. It will reflect a generosity of spirit. 

Someone has said, “Only the best is good enough for God”. Yet, if our best isn’t really very good, I believe God still receives it as a delighted parent. 

Let’s think about how we can offer worship, both personally, and in Church, to God. We pray that God will show us. Sometimes, the answers will surprise us. 

To the praise of God and the benefit of each other, where worship comes from the heart, we all have a part to play.

Amen

Prayers of Thanksgiving and Intercession

Let us pray 

Offer one item on the news that you would want to bring before God.

Offer one person who is on your mind before God

Offer one member of your family

Remember one person in the Church 

Offer one concern in your own life 

Remember all those who are praying at this time 

The Lord hears our prayer. 

Thanks be to God. Amen

Hymn SoF 308 Jesus, the very thought of Thee

The Grace 

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all, evermore. Amen