Koonung Heights Uniting Church
Service of Worship at Home
7 July 2024 – 10am or whenever possible
You may like to light a candle during your time of worship.
Feel free to text the Peace to other members of the congregation.
Today’s service is led by Ray Michelle – Chair of Koonung Heights Church Council
Introit: “Sing Amen” – (TiS 704)
Sing Amen: Amen, we praise your name, O Lord.
Sing Amen: Amen, we praise your name, O Lord.
Sing Amen: Amen, amen, amen, amen,
Amen, we praise your name, O Lord.
Candle Lighting: As we gather to worship we light the Christ candle
remembering the One who asked “Who do you say that I am?”
God sent his light to the world in Jesus Christ,
the light that shines in the darkness, the light that has never been overcome.
Acknowledgement of Country:
As we meet to worship today,
I acknowledge the Wurundjeri WoiWurrung People of the Kulin nation,
the first inhabitants and custodians of this place
from time beyond remembering.
I pay my respects to their elders,
past and present
and all future generations.
I also remember and pay my respects
to those who have faithfully worshipped,
and shared their gifts and lives with us at Koonung Heights.
I pray the God of love will continue to speak to us all.
Call to Worship:
Leader: Come to me,
all you who are weary and burdened,
and I will give you rest.
All: We come, Lord Jesus,
we are weary and heavily burdened
and long for the rest you give.
Leader: Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
All: We take your yoke upon us, Lord Jesus,
make it easy and lighten our load.
Leader: I am gentle and humble in heart,
and you will find rest for your souls.
All: We come to find that rest for our souls.
Be gentle, Lord Jesus, and humble our hearts.
We Sing: I am the light of the word
I am the Light of the World
You people come and follow me.
If you follow and love, You’ll learn the mystery
Of what you were meant to do and be.
1. When the song of the angels is stilled.
When the star in the sky is gone.
When the kings and the shepherds have found their way home.
The work of Christmas is begun!
2. To find the lost and lonely one,
To heal that broken soul with love,
To feed the hungry children with warmth and good food,
To feel the earth below the sky above!
3. To free the prisoner from his chains,
To make the powerful care,
To rebuild the nations with strength and goodwill,
To call a man your brother everywhere.
4. To bring hope to every task you do,
To dance at a baby’s new birth,
To make music in an old man’s heart,
And sing to the colors of the earth!
Prayer of Adoration and Confession:
Welcoming God,
we come to you
as we often do,
knowing that you
are waiting with open arms,
ready to welcome us,
your family,
here in this place.
Welcoming Jesus,
so often the recipient of hospitality
and yet willing to sit with anyone,
saint and sinner alike,
we come to you
knowing you are prepared to budge up
and let us sit with you.
Welcoming Spirit,
so often hidden from sight
and yet so large a part
of any gathering of God’s people,
we come to you
knowing that the whispers of welcome
are all around us.
Knowing we are welcomed
and yet knowing that we
have not always been deserving of that welcome,
your wide arms of grace, O God,
are too much to take in.
When we come with our heads dipped in shame
you gently lift our chins,
gaze into our eyes,
and say: welcome child,
so good to see you.
Lord, may we never take this for granted,
try harder to live up to your gracious welcome,
accept your love and, in turn,
offer that same love and welcome
to all whom we meet.
Lord, gracious Lord,
hear our prayer.
Amen.
Words of Assurance:
Come to me,
come to me,
come to me,
is the chorus of your invitation, God.
Yet we arrive carrying so much baggage:
things done and left undone.
We arrive with the very things we sought to leave behind:
plans half-baked and hopes over-cooked.
And still, you are there:
arms outstretched,
welcome table prepared,
grace already weaving its slow path
through the warp and weft of our lives.
Easy is your yoke,
light is your burden,
steadfast is your kindness,
set us free to rest in you.
Amen.
Thanks be to God.
Passing the Peace:
The peace of Christ has been given to us, not as a gift of the world which will pass away but as a gift from heaven which is eternal.
The peace of Christ be with you …
and also with you.
A Time for All:
Symbols that we use or see often which some have determined this explanation.
Fish
Sometimes you can see a fish attached to cars as a Christian symbol. The fish symbol says a lot about the driver: Christians are coming. The fish is one of the oldest symbols of Christianity and has its origin in early Christianity about 2000 years ago. When, under the rule of the Romans with their belief in many gods, it was still forbidden and life-threatening to call oneself a Christian, people invented a secret code to identify themselves. The choice fell on the fish. The story of the fish as a symbol of identification fell into oblivion over time and the cross became the true religious symbol of Christians. Only in the second half of the 20th century did the fish experience a revival as a Christian symbol.
Candle
A candle brings light and life and is in contrast to darkness and gloom. The eternal light that burns in every church symbolises the presence of God. Just as man can see nothing without light, so the human spirit can know nothing without the light of God’s Spirit. But the candle is also a symbol of the transience of life. In the church, candles often play an important role, for example as baptismal candles or communion candles, which are meant to illuminate the further life of the baptised person or teenager.
Dove
The dove is a symbol of reconciliation with God and, since the 6th century AD, a sign of the Holy Spirit. Just as the dove always finds its way back, so the Spirit of God always takes us back to our origin. In the account of Jesus’ baptism, the Holy Spirit appears in the form of a dove: “As soon as Jesus was baptised and came out of the water, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending on him like a dove”. (Mt 3:16)
Water
Water is a Christian symbol for new life. Thus, water at baptism is an important symbol for purity and the beginning of life. Just as Jesus was baptised with water by John the Baptist, so those who believe in him are baptised in his name.
What would your symbol be to represent Christ to you?
Bible Reading: Deuteronomy 13:1-5
“If there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and he gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes to pass, of which he spoke to you, saying, “Let us go after other gods”—which you have not known—”and let us serve them,” you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for the LORD your God is testing you to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after the LORD your God and fear Him, and keep His commandments and obey His voice; you shall serve Him and hold fast to Him. But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has spoken in order to turn you away from the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of bondage, to entice you from the way in which the LORD your God commanded you to walk. So you shall put away the evil from your midst.
Bible Reading: Matthew 24:24-26
For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. “Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it.
Bible Reading: Revelation 16:13-14
And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.
Reflection:
Busted
The light turned amber, just in front of him. He did the right thing, stopped at the lights, even though he could have beaten the red light by accelerating through the intersection. The tailgating woman was furious and tooted her horn, screaming in frustration, as she missed her change to get through the intersection, dropping her cell phone and makeup. As she was still in mid-rant, she heard a tap on her window and looked up into the face of a very serious police officer. The officer ordered her to exit her car with her hands up. He took her to the police station where she was searched, fingerprinted, photographed, and placed in a holding cell. After a couple of hours, a policeman approached the cell and opened the door. She was escorted back to the booking desk where the arresting officer was waiting with her personal effects. He said, “I’m very sorry for the mistake. You see, I pulled up behind your car while you were blowing your horn, flipping off the guys in front of you and mouthing off at him. I noticed the ‘What Would Jesus Do’ bumper sticker, the ‘Choose Life” license plate holder, the ‘Follow Me to Sunday School’ bumper sticker, and the chrome plated Christian fish emblem on the boot, so naturally …… I assumed you had stolen the car. “
After you hear that you will have many thoughts outside of laughter
Maybe you have some of those signs on your car? And let’s be real we do make assumptions and even take actions with signs we see on cars, ie highway patrol causes us to do an extra check, emergency sirens to pull over etc. Those signs are intentional but before we start making assumptions of others, lets each of us take a minute to things about ourselves. What are the overt messages we are giving by our clothes, our appearance, our tattoos, words on our tee shifts? Events we attend.
All are overt examples and people will make assumptions in the church, community in our families and maybe in our relationships because of these. These are the messages we are choosing to share, sometimes you may not even agree with the overt message but peer pressure or maybe if you’re a politician wanting votes you may choose to participate in the overt sign of something you don’t fully agree with.
Moving to the covert signs. These can be your responses to situations such as actions whether spoken or physically allows interpretation by others, based on the life experiences that have had to form an opinion. When you speak your opinion more judgements of you from your opinion sign can occur. Now this is where people can then choose paths, to support you cos you are supporting their view, they can be wrapped if they want to put you down as they feel you always were like that anyway or I told you so, or a compassionate person may stop and think, what has shaped them to have this opinion.
Deuteronomy gives a warning of watching for signs of false prophets and you will be tested, well that would not of been easy at that time, but really is it just as hard today ? Matthew also has that warning for us also and it’s hard to see that with so many signs in the world today In our instant world.
In revelation Johns vision again speaks of the false prophets.
The other day when some of us visited the mosque I really reflected on the day. A large part of the talk was I took as celebrating the common ground we have a Muslim and Christian rather than our diversity. The respect was so real in that room. The sign I took that sign of respect. The more they spoke how for years in war torn areas they actually have lived together and can again.
Heather shared with me a few months ago when she remembered when she was in Indonesia and visiting a temple complex. There were some stunning women from Sumatra there who wanted to take a photo of Heather. They kept saying how beautiful she was and wanted to have their photo with her. It seemed ridiculous but they had photos and they all said thanks. Later on Heather was telling her cousin’s driver about this and he explained that they were seeing Heather as beautiful because of what she was wearing … a long skirt and three-quarter length sleeved shirt. What was beautiful was not necessarily what she looked like … but it was beautiful because Heather was showing respect to their tradition of appropriate dress … not like so many tourists.
Getting back to the signs what signs are we giving to our community, apart from the message what does out sign say about us? Our statement of the heart? I was working with a person leaving the Pentecostal Faith and choosing to go Catholic. Apart from supporting my passion got the better of me and I asked why were you not going Uniting? He replied well you guys must be short on numbers cos you accepted everything. I must admit I was taken back as I reflected what do others think of our stance on social issues.
What signs do we say personally to our neighbours, friends from other groups we in who probably know we go to church, however are there some signs that they challenge us? I am going to share some of my areas of development in the hope of allowing others to reflect privately on what might be your false prophet? One thing for me is forgiveness, I know when I am deeply hurt, I fire. To then get back to letting it go is hard, and is that showing the right sign? I know it’s not, but I have to work at it. They might be the false prophet within me. Letting go, is really hard.
I also question the times when I could have spoken up for others and haven’t, sometime rather than ruffle I let the racist remarks just sit there. Perhaps there are times which I could have donated more and yet didn’t. Times when I could have used the talents that I have been given more easily. I know you and I need to be proud of who we are, what we believe in and that God has chosen us . Display our signs of being a follow of Christ covertly first backed up overtly. And remember the cross as the greatest sign of love.
We Sing: To God Be the Glory – (TiS 147)
To God be the glory
Great things He has done
So loved He the world that He gave us His Son
Who yielded His life an atonement for sin
And opened the life-gate that all may go in
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord
Let the earth hear His voice
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord
Let the people rejoice
Come to the Father
Through Jesus the Son
Give Him the glory
Great things He has done.
O perfect redemption, the purchase of blood
To every believer the promise of God
The vilest offender who truly believes
That moment from Jesus a pardon receives
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord…
Great things He has taught us, great things He has done
And great our rejoicing through Jesus the Son
But purer, and higher, and greater will be
Our wonder, our worship, when Jesus we see
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord…
Prayer of Dedication:
Lord,
we bring to you our offerings:
our money, our time and ourselves,
not as payment for something given
but out of adoration and thanksgiving
for all we have received.
Take what we offer and who we are,
bless them to the work of this church
and your kingdom.
Amen.
Prayers for others prepared by Wendy and Graham Ray
Let us pray
Before we pray for others, we pray first for ourselves.
Wherever we are, however we feel, empower us to be Your feet and hands.
Don’t let us sink in the immensity of the challenges before us.
Strengthen and enthuse us to continue to take small steps to achieve change in people’s lives and our own.
May we always seek to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God
And bring our neighbours closer to us, so that we can more clearly see them and their needs.
We pray for those who are your hands and feet in bringing justice and mercy to them.
We pray for the decision makers in our community.
May their deliberations and actions
be motivated by fairness and equity
rather than personal preference or party politics.
As many of your followers spread the Gospel throughout the world,
We pray for all those women and men in Synods, Church Councils and congregations
who spread the Gospel in our world.
We pray for all God’s people suffering the storms of life, experiencing conflict and disasters.
May they understand that You are a stronghold in times of trouble.
We pray also for those whom we know and love, and whom we name now, in the silence of our hearts [pause] Hold them close – Comfort them – Strengthen and reassure them
And finally, we pray for ourselves. Hold us close. Comfort us. Strengthen and reassure us
So that we can be what You want us to be.
This we ask saying the Lord’s Prayer together
Let us now join in the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples:
Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be your name,
your Kingdom come,
your will be done on earth as in Heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.
For the Kingdom, the power and the glory are yours now and for ever.
Amen.
We Sing: Thank you Lord
I come before You today
And there’s just one thing that I want to say
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
For all You’ve given to me
For all the blessings that I cannot see
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
With a grateful heart
With a song of praise
With an outstretched arm
I will bless Your name
Thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
For all You’ve done in my life
You took my darkness and gave me Your light
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
You took my sin and my shame
You took my sickness and healed all my pain
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
With a grateful heart
With a song of praise
With an outstretched arm
I will bless Your name
And thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord, thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Oh, thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord (I just wanna thank you, Lord)
Oh, thank you, Lord
I just want to thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Oh, we thank You
Oh, we thank you, Lord
Lift Your voice, thank you, Lord
All You’ve done in our lives, we just wanna say thank you, Lord
Oh, thank you, Lord, thank you, Lord
Yes we do
Oh, we wanna say thank you, Lord
Yes (oh, I thank you, Lord) thank you, Lord (oh)
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord, thank you, Lord, thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord, with a grateful heart
With a grateful heart
With a song of praise
With an outstretched arm
I will bless Your name
Oh, thank you, Lord, yes
I just wanna thank you, Lord (I just wanna thank you, Lord)
Thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord
Thank You, thank You, thank You (thank you, Lord)
I just wanna thank you, Lord (I just wanna thank you, Lord)
Thank you, Lord
I just wanna thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Yes, we thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Thank you, Lord
Yes, we thank You, oh, we thank You
Sending
God of design and creation’s manufacture,
Jesus, purifier and water of life,
Spirit, sustainer and the world’s preservation agent,
before you we gathered,
from you we take,
away with you we go,
taking up the cause as you demand:
we go to serve your world.
We Sing: May the feet of God – (TiS 779)
May the feet of God walk with you
And his hand hold you tight
May the eye of God rest on you
And his ear hear your cry
May the smile of God be for you
And his breath give you life
May the child of God grow in you
And his love bring you home
(Thanks to all those who have assisted in preparation for this liturgy with encouragement, prayers and conversation. I have also utilised the following resources:- Spill the Beans (Issue 35)