Prelude Miriam Enman
Call to Worship
Leader: We continue our Lenten “season of recovery” as we focus on heal as essential to our spiritual lives.
Lenten Refrain (Sung)
Vessels, holy and whole
Broken, needing the One
Open, body and soul
Healer, come.
Leader: God gathers us as a Beachcomber gathers and marvels at every precious surviving piece of beach glass she finds.
People: We are never alone, we are never lost to the One who seeks humanity’s wholeness.
Leader: We affirm our commitment to be the Body of Christ that knows we cannot be personally healed until we see the interconnected community as par to the healing process.
People: Jesus has the power to re-vision the family of God in which false boundaries are overcome.
Leader: In a year of devastating loss of livelihood,
People: we consider the economic health that reimagines status quo.
Lenten Refrain (Sung)
Vessels, holy and whole
Broken, needing the One
Open, body and soul
Healer, come.
Hymn: Community of Christ (to melody of The Battle Is the Lord’s)
Community of Christ, who make the cross your own,
live out your creed and risk your life for God alone:
the God who wears your face, to whom all worlds belong,
whose children are of every race and every song.
Community of Christ, look past the church’s door
and see the refugee, the hungry, and the poor.
Take hands with the oppressed, the jobless in your street,
take towel and water, that you wash your neighbor’s feet.
Community of Christ, through whom the word must sound-
cry out for justice and for peace the whole world round:
disarm the powers that war and all that can destroy,
turn bombs to bread, and tears of anguish into joy.
When menace melts away, so shall God’s will be done,
the climate of the world be peace and Christ its sun;
our currency be love and kindliness our law,
our food and faith be shared as one for ev-er-more.
Prayer and Lord’s Prayer
Leader: Let us acknowledge our need to restore, repair, renew our Holy Vessels, which include the communities of which we are a part. Let us pray:
You created us for each other. You set in us a yearning for companionship and an empathy that binds us together, protecting each other and delighting in one another. Yet too often we have broken down our relationships instead of building them up. We have been set against one another with the lie of scarcity. We have built systems and economics that widen the gap of resources rather than safeguarding equitable practices. Too many, and growing numbers, are suffering hardship, food insecurity, joblessness. We cannot fathom the proportions of loss and so we look away, sometimes even from the need in our own community. Help us, Healer. Show us our empathy. Forgive our complacence. Move us to move one step at ta time toward greater care for one another. We sense and acknowledge our yearning for wholeness praying: 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. And 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.
Lenten Refrain (Sung)
Vessels, holy and whole
Broken, needing the One
Open, body and soul
Healer, come.
Offering
Special Music
Prayer for Offering
Almighty God, we thank you for the covenant which you have opened to us through Jesus Christ our Lord. Accept these offerings with the dedication of our lives, that we may be for the world a sign of your abiding love and a testament to your enduring promise. In Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, all honor and glory are yours, Almighty God. Amen.
Prayer of the Day
In your love, make us whole.
Hymn: We Are Called to Be God’s People
We are called to be God’s people, showing by our lives his grace,
one in hart and one in spirit, sing of hope for all the race.
Let us show how he has changed us, and remade us as his own,
let us share our life together as we shall around his throne.
We are called to be God’s servants, working in his world today;
taking his own task upon us, all his sacred words obey.
Let us rise, then, to his summons, dedicated to him our all,
that we may be faithful servants, quick to answer now his call.
We are called to be God’s prophets, speaking for the truth and right,
standing firm for godly justice, bringing evil things to lights.
Let us seek the courage needed, our high calling to fulfill,
that the world may know the blessing of the doing of God’s will.
Scripture: Matthew 8: 5-13
When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible distress.” And he said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion answered, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. For I am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it.” When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who followed him, “Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.” And the servant was healed in that hour.
Questions to Ponder:
- The centurion (army commander), a non-Jew, is not a part of the community of Jesus followers. The servant for whom he is advocating is a gentile and a slave, “the ultimate nobody.” Yet Jesus responds to them. What sort of imaginary boundaries do we have when it comes to the Body of Christ or Kingdom of God?
- In what ways does our community (church, city, region, state, country) create boundaries?
- In what ways are we living out the Kin-dom in which all people come together around the table of God?
- How are we, through the power of Jesus Christ bringing healing and wholeness to our communities? If we are not, what do we need to start doing?
- Do we believe that through Jesus, we can bring healing to our communities?
Hymn: The Voice of God is Calling
The voice of God is calling to women and to men;
the voice once heard in Zion, resounds on earth again:
whom shall I sent to succor my people in their need?
Whom shall I send to loosen the bonds of shame and greed?
I hear my people crying in slum and mine and mill;
no field or mart is silent, no city street is still.
I see my people falling in darkness and despair.
Whom shall I send to shatter the getters which they bear?
We heed, O God, your summons, and answer: Here are we!
Spend us upon your errand; let us your servants be.
Our strength is dust and ashes, our years a passing hour,
But you can use our weakness to magnify your power.
From ease and plenty save us; from pride and place absolve;
purge us of low desire; life us to high resold;
take us, and make us holy; teach us your will and way.
Speak, and, behold! We answer; command, and we obey!
Blessing
Now go with confidence that the Holy Beachcomber is gathering us all for “Safe Keeping,” recovering our depth of love for all and our joy of living in this world. May the words of Jesus ring in your ears: “I will come.” And may the Spirit hover, move, and deliver salve to your soul and a spring in your step.
Lenten Refrain (Sung Solo)
Vessels, holy and whole
Broken, needing the One
Open, body and soul
Healer, come.
Postlude