Please Note: The church building is currently closed due to the COVID-19 “Safer at Home” quarantine. Weekly worship services are still occurring via YouTube (see below).
On Sunday, May 3rd, at 10am, click here for our Worship Service.
KNOWING WHO TO FOLLOW
Rev. Wesley Snedeker
Boy, it’s an odd time to watch the news.
There is an unsettling dissonance between what we seem to know is morally right and what we politically maintain is advisable in our state government’s response to the COVID-19 crisis. Death tolls continue to climb, but our state wants neither to know nor talk about how many are dying. Social distancing is a proven, easy way to contain the spread, but it’s economically inconvenient so they need to limit our limited isolation. We know that going to work, opening restaurants, and participating in public gatherings is probably a bad idea, but our state is unwilling to provide proper support or extend the moratorium on evictions, so contribution to the GDP remains a prerequisite for survival.
In John 10, Jesus talks about knowing who to follow. The Johannine Jesus identifies himself as the proper, life-giving way for the sheep and the righteous shepherd, while others are condemned as thieves and bandits. It’s a difficult and exclusive passage to be sure, but it brings up important questions about how we know who is acting in the way of God and who is seeking only exploitative power. Join us in worship this Sunday as we consider these concerns together. — Wesley
Come back here on Sunday, May 3rd at 10:00am to watch the service on our YouTube channel by clicking on the icon below.
COMMUNION ELEMENTS
Holy Communion will be “served“ during our online worship service this Sunday, May 3rd. Each worshipping participant is asked to supply his/her own bread and wine from the bounty of their own home. Because bread comes in so many forms, the Pastors encourage you to use what you have in your cupboard or pantry — a small piece of bread, an oyster cracker, leftover toast from breakfast.
For the wine, your choices are broader —- grape juice, fruit juice, lemonade, and of course the real thing.
Whatever we use this Sunday for Holy Communion, we come together in the hope that the act of communally remembering the life, death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ will find us strengthened as we gather in our homes.
May our faith unite us as we partake of this sacramental meal.
REJOICE IN GOD!
Worship for the 4th Sunday of Easter
May 3, 2020 – Bulletin
Welcome and Announcements
Opening Prayer: (from For God and the People by Walter Rauschenbusch)
O God, we thank thee for the sweet refreshment of sleep and for the glory and vigor of the new day. As we set our faces once more toward our daily work, we pray thee for the strength sufficient for our tasks. May Christ’s spirit of duty and service ennoble all we do. Uphold us by the consciousness that our work is useful work and a blessing to all. If there has been anything in our work harmful to others and dishonorable to ourselves, reveal it to our inner eye with such clearness that we shall hate it and put it away, though it be at a loss to ourselves. When we work with others, help us to regard them, not as servants to our will, but as brothers equal to us in human dignity, and equally worthy of their full reward. May there be nothing in this day’s work of which we shall be ashamed when the sun has set, nor in the eventide of our life when our task is done and we go to our long home to meet thy face. Amen.
Music “Blowin’ in the Wind” by Bob Dylan performed by Rev. Wesley Snedeker
Children’s Sermon
Scripture Readings
Psalm 23
John 10:1-10
Message “Knowing Who to Follow” Rev. Wesley Snedeker
Offering Invitation
Offertory “My Shepherd Shall Supply My Need” Amy Maneval
Prayers of the People
Silent Prayer
Lord’s Prayer
Holy Communion
Unison Communion Affirmations of Faith
I believe that bread comes from grain that grows in the wind and the rain with the farmer’s help far from the eyes of city folk.
I believe that bread comes from the love of God, the love of the farmer, the love of the baker’s hands, the love of those who bring it to me.
I believe that bread can be and should be broken and shared and given to all persons until all have enough and then some.
I believe that Jesus loved bread and took it and broke it and blessed it and fed his disciples and asked them to feed us forever.
I believe enough in bread to want it from Jesus, to want it to nurture me, to want his life through it, to want to give life through it.
I believe that his body, as bread, feeds me, and as part of his body, I want to be bread for others.
I believe the Spirit will help me as well as Jesus’ people. Amen.
Sharing of the Elements.
Giving Thanks
All: Lord, you now have set your servants free to go in peace as you have promised. For these eyes of ours have seen the Savior whom you have prepared for all the world to see! Blessing and honor and glory are yours, now and forever.
One: You have seen the Savior. Go now in peace. And the blessing of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, go with you.
All: Amen
Closing Prayer: (from For God and the People by Walter Rauschenbusch)
O Thou great companion of our souls, do thou go with us today and comfort us by the sense of thy presence in the hours of spiritual isolation. Give us a single eye for duty. Guide us by the voice within. May we take heed of all the judgments of men and gather patiently whatever truth they hold, but teach us still to test them by the words and the spirit of the one who alone is our Master. May we not be so wholly of one mind with the life that now is that the world can fully approve us, but may we speak the higher truth and live the purer righteousness which thou has revealed to us. If men speak well of us, may we not be puffed up; if they slight us, may we not be cast down; remembering the words of our Master who bade us rejoice when men speak evil against us and tremble if all speak well, that so we may have evidence that we are still soldiers of God. Amen.
