ORDER OF SERVICE FOR SUNDAY, MARCH 5, 2023
SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT
Due to copyright limitations, we are unable to print the words to many of the songs. However, our musicians have chosen music to fit the scriptures. We invite you to look up the words in your worship book and ponder them. If you do not have a worship book, ponder the words to one of your favourite hymns and listen for God’s voice. Those who have internet may find the songs on YouTube.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
“Jesus did not come to change the mind of God about humanity (it did not need changing)! Jesus came to change the mind of humanity about God.”
~Richard Rohr, Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi
BEFORE WE WORSHIP, WE REFLECT…
“God so loved the world” may be a familiar affirmation, but it has radical implications. If God loved the world into being and loved it so utterly that God became incarnate in Jesus Christ, then everything we do to restore the web of life is an expression of our faith in the God who loves the whole creation. When the natural world is degraded by climate change, habitat loss, and pollution, Christians must bear witness to God’s steadfast love for the planet God entrusted to our care. Who will believe the declaration that “God so loved the world” if we ourselves do not? By committing ourselves to join with others in safeguarding God’s creation, we share in the ministry of Christ, through whom God reconciled all things.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We acknowledge we gather and worship on Treaty 1 Territory, the original lands of Anishinaabeg, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, and Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Métis Nation.
Holy Spirit, fill us with the power and the courage to trust in you and to trust in others. Help us to trust in the deep wisdom and traditional knowledges that you have gifted to our Indigenous neighbours. Help us to accept the gift of learning from our neighbours that we may broaden and deepen our understanding of how to live together, to share resources, to put our complementary skills to work together, and most of all to build on our common desire to live in wholeness together as all of your peoples. We thank you for the blessing you have given us to know you better by getting to know our neighbours better in all of their diverse God-given beauty. Guide us, we pray. Amen.
CALL TO WORSHIP
Into the structures of our creeds and systems bursts the Mystery,
and growth cannot be resisted.
Into the air of certitude and reasoning blows the wind of the Spirit,
and the church is renewed.
Into routine patterns of thought and living creep uncertainty and longing,
and God’s people are born again.
We stand in awe as we seek to experience the magnitude of God’s grace and glory.
Let the journey begin. Let us worship God.
CHILDREN’S SONG: Count Your Blessings
CENTERING PRAYER
We have chosen to fast. Not with ashes but with actions, not with sackcloth but in sharing, not in thoughts but in deeds. We will give up our abundance to share our food with the hungry. We will give up our comfort to provide homes for the destitute. We will give up our fashions to see the naked clothed. We will share where others hoard. We will free where others oppress. We will heal where others harm. Then God’s light will break out on us, God’s healing will quickly appear, God will guide us always. God’s righteousness will go before us. We will find our joy in the Lord, we will be like a well-watered garden, we will be called repairers of broken walls. Together we will feast at God’s banquet table. Amen.
— written by Christine Sine
A NEW CREED
We are not alone; we live in God’s world.
We believe in God: who has created and is creating, who has come in Jesus, the Word made flesh, to reconcile and make new, who works in us and others by the Spirit.
We trust in God.
We are called to be the Church: to celebrate God’s presence, to live with respect in Creation, to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil, to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen, our judge and our hope.
In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God.
CHILDREN’S CHAT
When I was 21, I left Ottawa and moved to Calgary to finish my university degree. For 10 months I lived with my aunt and uncle, and then I found my own apartment. I can tell you I had a lot less stuff than Sarai and Abram! Until I had money to purchase furniture, I sat on the floor to eat, I slept on the floor, I typed my essays on the floor – and I loved every minute of it!
Like Sarai and Abram, I felt called by God to move out west. Like Abram and Sarai, I was excited, and scared at the same time. Like Sarai and Abram, I trusted God, and God sent people into my life to help me learn how to live on my own, helped find me a job, people who made me feel welcomed and loved.
God still calls me to have adventures! I still trust God to guide me. God still puts people in my life who inspire me. My life with God has never been dull!
So, to what adventure is God calling you?
MINUTE FOR MISSION: Empowering Women to Be Agents of Change
Maina Bai’s mother died when she was a baby, and Maina never went to school.
When she was just 10 years old, her father married her off to an older man. By 16, she had a child. A few years after the birth of her daughter, her husband died. When she returned to her maternal home, Maina was married off―again.
After a few years of marriage, Maina became a widow again. Single, she faced extraordinary stigma.
Approximately 2.18 million single women like Maina live in the state of Rajasthan, India. Whether they are widowed, divorced, or have never been married, these women are deemed “incomplete” and a disgrace to their families. As a result, many live lives marked by stigma, fear, and violence―simply for not being married.
Your gifts support Mission & Service partner Astha Sansthan, “Association of Strong Women Alone” (ASWA). In 20 years, the association grew from 450 single women to over 70,000 members.
ASWA’s approach is simple: Create a safe space for single women to come together and get the knowledge and skills necessary to improve their lives.
The association has made all the difference for Maina.
She can now read and write and is empowering other women to become literate. Because of her leadership, 35 women have enrolled in adult learning. All of them now have grade eight certificates. What’s more, the generational cycle of illiteracy has been broken. Maina’s daughter can not only read and write but is also teaching others to do the same, opening up opportunities and increasing independence.
Your Mission & Service gifts empower women like Maina to be agents of change within their communities. Thank you for your generosity.
PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
Living God, help us so to hear your holy Word that we may truly understand; that, understanding, we may believe, and, believing, we may follow in all faithfulness and obedience, seeking your honor and glory in all that we do; through Christ our Lord. Amen.
READINGS AND PSALM
First Reading: Genesis 12:1-4a
God’s call of Abram and Sarai has a clear purpose—that through them all the families of the earth would gain a blessing. As they set out on their journey, they are accompanied by promises of land, nation, and a great reputation.
1The Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
4aSo Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him.
Psalm 121
R: I lift up my eyes to the hills; my help comes from the Lord. (Ps. 121:1, 2)
1I lift up my eyes to the hills; from where is my help to come?
2My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.
3The Lord will not let your foot be moved nor will the one who watches over you fall asleep.
4Behold, the keeper of Israel will neither slumber nor sleep; R
5the Lord watches over you; the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
6the sun will not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
7The Lord will preserve you from all evil and will keep your life.
8The Lord will watch over your going out and your coming in, from this time forth forevermore. R
Second Reading: Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
In the person and example of Abraham we discover that a right relationship with God does not involve earning a reward from God but entails trusting God’s promises. Abraham is the forebear and model for both Jews and Gentiles, because we too trust that ours is a God who gives life to the dead.
1What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestor according to the flesh? 2For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3For what does the scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” 4Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due. 5But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness.
13For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. 14If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
16For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, 17as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
Gospel: John 3:1-17
A curious Pharisee visits Jesus by night to learn from the teacher his friends reject. Jesus speaks to him about life in the Spirit and the kingdom of God.
1Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 2He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” 3Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” 4Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” 5Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. 6What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ 8The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” 9Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” 10Jesus answered him, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
11“Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. 12If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? 13No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. 14And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
16“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
17“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
HYMN: VU 842 Unto The Hills
SERMON
Raymond and I have three daughters. We have experienced many special, wondrous moments with each of them. The most amazing moments were the moments they were born. Words cannot express the deep love and connection I felt when I held each child in my arms, nursed each one for the first time and realized that Raymond and I actually created a tiny human! It was an incredible moment, that moment of birth!
And yet …
That moment was the culmination of one long process, and the starting point of another long process. Each daughter was able to be born because some months earlier my husband and I conceived them. And THAT act happened because several years before that, we met, dated, got engaged, and got married. And all along the journey of our lives, there were events and decisions and influences that affected each of us, and us as a couple, and eventually our three daughters. In other words, “being born” is an event, a point in time — but it is also the result of a process, a process with tendrils that reach sometimes far into the past, but that certainly reach to a matching moment of conception.
Jesus is clear about the need for spirit-birth. Without being born from above, of the Spirit, you cannot see nor enter the kingdom of God. Without having your eyes opened by the Spirit, your heart touched by the Spirit, your understanding of the world illumined by the Spirit, you can’t see the kingdom all around you, nor can you enter it. That much is clear.
However, I believe we have taken that profound truth and twisted it, cheapened it, by focusing only on the birth event and not on the process of gestation. We have reduced that amazing moment that was the culmination of so many other moments and turned it into a question, a question answered in just that single moment, and assumed we would get the same result. It’s as if we asked someone “do you want to have a child” and if they answered Yes, then ‘snap!’, there’s a newborn in their arms!
How is our understanding of John 3 increased if we expand “you must be born again” into “you must allow the seeds of the Spirit to enter your soul, germinate there, grow there, until finally they come forth in an amazing and God-filled way, and your very nature and your relationship to all around you is changed forever?” How does this understanding of the gestation period of growing in the Spirit affect our relationship to others, if we know that the way we deal with them might be part of the growing. Are we okay with trusting the process of growing “into” the Spirit as God’s timing and the Spirit moving as it will, rather than us trying to force a new birth through spiritual inducing?
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.” This verse expresses God’s profound love for us and indicates the depths to which God would go to convey that love. This verse, however, has sometimes served as a wedge between those who believe and are saved and those who do not and, some conclude, must therefore perish and not have eternal life.
Reading just one more verse offers a larger context and, indeed, elaborates on the “motive” for God’s sending of the Son. In particular, lest we be confused that God sends the Son out of love – which is of course where verse 16 begins – in verse 17, we hear the clear explanation, affirmation, and indeed repetition that the Son was not sent to condemn but to save. So, it’s not about who’s in and who’s out, but rather about God’s consistent intent to love, save, and bless the whole world.
Faith is not a once-and-done action of the believer. It is an ongoing work of the Spirit who, as Jesus says, blows where it chooses. For some, the coming of the Spirit and faith will be a dramatic event – a birth; for others it will move more slowly – growing into the Sprit. Whichever the case, the writer of John would shift attention away from our specific events. Jesus makes it plain that the character of the heart goes beyond a particular decision and instead invites us to witness the powerful and unpredictable activity of the Spirit. Believers therefore should pray and give thanks for God’s Spirit, eager and ready to testify to God’s ongoing activity in their lives.
Being born again takes us back to Sarai and Abram. The Spirit called, they trusted and obeyed and the adventure of following that call helped them grow into the Spirit. Those imperfect, trusting people became the backbone of nations. The fulfilled promise was years in the making and included many wrong turns, and u turns. Ultimately, faith prevailed, and the love and promise of God was experienced profoundly.
The reality of life is that once those daughters of ours were born, the birth became the past, and the focus became the enjoyment of seeing what each new day would bring as our relationship with our children grew.
Physical birth, once it happens, is completed. Spiritual birth, or re-birth, is an adventure that holds endless possibilities, all the love of God, and the opportunity to be part of God’s continuous creating. Rather than getting caught up in the question – are you saved? – perhaps it would be truer to God’s Spirit to ask instead, “would you like to come with me on an adventure with God?!”
May it be so. Amen.
HYMN OF THE MONTH: VU 105 Dust And Ashes Touch Our Face
PRAYERS OF INTERCESSION
Sustained by God’s abundant mercy, let us pray for the church, the world, and all of creation.
O God, you so love your church. Raise up leaders who care for your people. Bless lay theologians, seminary and college professors, and all who are called to the ministry of teaching, that they form and inspire us for the work of the gospel. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
O God, you so love your creation. Breathe new life into our planetary home. Guide the work of researchers, scientists, and activists who love your earth and who inspire us to care for the natural world. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
O God, you so love the world. Uphold leaders who resist tyranny and oppression. Strengthen organizations that promote peace and harmony (especially). Direct their work to alleviate human suffering and to address its root causes. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
O God, you so love your people. Draw near to all who live with mental illness, depression, or addiction, and accompany them in healing and recovery. Hear the cries of those who look to you in their distress. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
O God, you so love your children. Bless the young in our midst, and delight us with their joy, wonder, and curiosity. Revive our ministries with children and youth and equip us all for faithful discipleship. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
O God, you so love your saints. As our ancestors in the faith have been a blessing to us, so inspire us by their example of holy living to be a blessing to those who come after us. Merciful God,
receive our prayer.
We lift our prayers to you, O God, trusting in your steadfast love and your promise to renew your whole creation; through Jesus Christ our Savior.
Amen.
THE LORD’S PRAYER
SENDING SONG:
BENEDICTION
God, the giver of love, ☩ Christ, the resurrection and the life, and the Holy Spirit of rebirth bless you in this Lenten journey. Amen.