Videoconference details are here, including a phone number to call (no PC necessary).
@ 9.30: I will be online – join early if you want to check the technology works.
@ 10.00: Pre service music: “How Long?” – https://bifrostartsmusic.bandcamp.com/track/how-long
@ 10.05 – we begin.
A light
shines in the darkness
Christ is the light of
the World
Psalm 130 NLT (read by Gill)
From the depths of despair, O Lord,
I call for your help.
2 Hear my cry, O Lord.
Pay attention to my prayer.
3 Lord, if you kept a record of our sins,
who, O Lord, could ever survive?
4 But you offer forgiveness,
that we might learn to fear you.
5 I am counting on the Lord;
yes, I am counting on him.
I have put my hope in his word.
6 I long for the Lord
more than sentries long for the dawn,
yes, more than sentries long for the dawn.
7 O Israel, hope in the Lord;
for with the Lord there is unfailing love.
His redemption overflows.
8 He himself will redeem Israel
from every kind of sin.
We sing together: Be Still and Know (3 verses) https://vimeo.com/400800853/856ecbcfdb
Be still and know that I am God. x3
I am the Lord who saves and heals. x3
In you, Lord God, I put my trust. x3
Birthday Sunday
Prayer (Donald):
Creator God,
As we look out our windows,
Experience our back yards
Maybe take a walk down the street
Rationing out exposure to your creation
We recognise its beauty
You watch over the sparrows, the tuis,
We hear your breath in the wind in the trees
We thank you that we are OK
We thank you that we are safe
As we sit in our houses, alone, or with others
As we watch or read endless news,
It can be easy to despair
Easy to become grouchy
Easy for our spouses, our flatmates, our children to get on our nerves
Forgiving God, forgive us and help us forgive others
Give us grace for each other,
Calm when we are worried,
And remind us to talk to others when we feel alone.
Amen.
Group Lectio Divina
We will read through the Bible reading twice. As we do so, we ask God to show us one part in particular that we need to hear.
Opening Prayer (Donald)
Quiet time: listen to Taize – The Lord is my Light (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFUJi7xmInc)
Bible reading: Romans 8:6-11 (The Message)
Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn’t pleased at being ignored.
But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won’t know what we’re talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms. It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he’ll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!
Moment of quiet
Discussion – breakout groups (via videoconference) – what did you hear, how are you feeling
Discussion – back in all as one
Prayers for others:
We sing together: May the mystery of God enfold us https://vimeo.com/400804865/e20eba7591
May the mystery of God enfold us,
may the wisdom of God uphold us,
may the fragrance of God be around us,
may the brightness of God surround us
May the wonder of God renew us,
may the loving of God flow through us,
may the peace of God deeply move us,
may the moving of God bring us peace.
Benediction (Donald)