September 4, 2022
WELCOME TO ST ANDREW’S ON THE TERRACE
Hato Anaru o Te Parehua
Founded 1840
Order of Service
4 September 2022
Water to Value
Pentecost 13
and Communion
Today’s service is led by Wendy and Andrew Matthews and Rosemary Lawrence
PRELUDE Air from Water Music; G.F.Handel
GATHERING Rev Dr Jim Cunningham
We come to be opened by visions
that can enlist us in larger causes
and more caring actions.
We come to hear words that might take
us into a deeper kind of integrity
and reconnect us with our better selves.
So may the warmer fullness that we seek
fill our hearts, our minds and our spirits.
PROCESSIONAL HYMN God of all time, WOV 553
Words: Shirley Murray AA 49 Tune:Highwood
God of all time, all seasons of our living,
source of our spark, protector of our flame,
blazing before our birth, beyond our dying,
God of all time, we come to sing your name.
Spirit who draws our fragile selves together,
Spirit who turns a stranger in to friend,
be at this table where we greet each other
be in the peace we pass from hand to hand.
Let us not die from poverty of caring,
let us not starve where love is to be shared.
Come, break us open to receive your healing:
your broken body be our wine and bread.
WELCOME
E te whānau a te Karaiti,
ngā mihi aroha ki a tātou katoa.
Kia ora tātou.
Talofa lava.
Talofa.
PRAYER Rosemary Lawrence
JESUS PRAYER © Rev Sherri Weinberg
God – heart of the world:
revealed through every aspect of creation:
understood through our awareness.
May we honour the holiness of creation and act accordingly
so that your love is reflected in the way we live.
May we always be thankful for the food we eat
and the friends we have.
May we forgive those who transgress against us
and be forgiven for our own.
In the freedom of love may we live as your heartbeat
and not be compromised by hesitation.
Through our freedom, may your justice be seen and heard and experienced.
Amen
LIGHTING THE RAINBOW CANDLE
We light the rainbow candle as a symbol of our inclusiveness and to acknowledge the special place children have in our community.
TIME WITH THE CHILDREN Wendy Matthews
BLESSING THE CHILDREN
We send you to the Rainbow Room to hear stories, ask questions and have fun together.
We bless you. Amen.
PASSING THE PEACE
Traditionally we shake hands to pass the peace and say “peace be with you“. Now that Covid is here we ask that you pass the peace without shaking hands.
THE WORD IN TEXTS Valerie Rhodes
Contemporary Reading from ‘This is All’ by Aidan Chambers
I thought how lovely and how strange a river is. A river is a river, always there, and yet the water flowing through it is never the same water and is never still. It’s always changing and is always on the move. And over time the river itself changes too. It widens and deepens as it rubs and scours, gnaws and kneads, eats and bores its way through the land. Even the greatest rivers – the Nile and the Ganges, the Yangtze and the Mississippi, the Amazon and the great grey-green greasy Limpopo all set about with fever trees – must have been no more than trickles and flickering streams before they grew into mighty rivers.
Are people like that? I wondered. Am I like that? Always me, like the river itself, always flowing but always different, like the water flowing in a river, sometimes walking steadily along andante, sometimes surging over rapids furioso, sometimes meandering with hardly any visible movement tranquilo, lento, sometimes gurgling with pleasure, sometimes sparkling in the sun, sometimes appassionato, sometimes misterioso, sometimes staccato, sometimes vivace, and always, I hope, amoroso.
Do I change like a river, widening and deepening, eddying back on myself sometimes, bursting my banks sometimes when there’s too much water, too much life in me, and sometimes dried up from lack of rain? Will the I that is me, grow and widen and deepen? Or will I stagnate and become an arid riverbed? Will I allow people to dam me up and confine me so that I flow only where they want? Will I allow them to turn me into a canal to use for their own purposes? Or will I make sure I flow freely, coursing my way through the land and ploughing a valley of my own?
RESPONSE
For the Word in scripture,
for the Word among us,
for the Word within us,
we give thanks.
REFLECTION Water to value Andrew Matthews
HYMN Touch the earth lightly AA143
Words: Shirley Murray Music: Colin Gibson
- Touch the earth lightly, use the earth gently,
nourish the life of the world in our care:
gift of great wonder, ours to surrender,
trust for the children tomorrow will bear.
- We who endanger, who create hunger,
agents of death for all creatures that live,
we who would foster clouds of disaster,
God of our planet, forestall and forgive!
- Let there be greening, birth from the burning,
water that blesses and air that is sweet,
health in God’s garden, hope in God’s children,
regeneration that peace will complete.
- God of all living, God of all loving,
God of the seedling, the snow and the sun,
teach us, deflect us, Christ re-connect us,
using us gently, and making us one.
OFFERTORY MUSIC Fiona McDougal and Mike Wespel-Rose
Siciliana and Aria 5 by G P Telemann
OFFERTORY HYMN Here we bring small or great AA 62
Words: Shirley Murray, Music: © Colin Gibson
Here we bring small or great
gifts to offer on this plate
What we’ve earned, what we own,
tithe or token, bread or stone.
[REFRAIN]
Jesus said, “Have a care – your hearts will always be,
where your riches are where your riches are.”
OFFERING PRAYER
We bring these gifts of food for those who need it.
We bring these gifts of money so this church may continue to make the way of Jesus a political reality.
We offer ourselves as pilgrim people, seeking to walk the way of light and love. Amen.
LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY OF ST ANDREW’S
People share notices and visitors are welcomed. If you have a notice, please move to the front row, ready to speak briefly from the lectern.
For the benefit of newcomers, please introduce yourself before you begin.
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE Rev Barrie Keenan
CIRCLE OF PRAYER
We think today of the people of Sri Lanka and the Maldives and Christian World Service Partners in Sri Lanka focussing on training and income generation, home gardens, research into sustainable agricultural and campaigning on the rights of the poor. We hold all refugees in our hearts. We pray in particular for those detained for many years in Papua New Guinea & Nauru. We give thanks for progress that has been made and pray that their calls for justice might yet find a compassionate response. In New Zealand, we remember those in Parliament, and today we name Christopher Luxon (Botany) and Jo Luxton (Rangitata). Here in the Central Presbytery, we pray for the leaders and people of Ngaio Union Church.
PRAYER FOR ST ANDREW’S
Renew your people, God,
and renew our life in this place.
Give us a new spirit of unity
with all who follow the Way of Jesus
and new bonds of love
with people of other faiths.
Bless the city in which we live
that it may be a place
where honest dealing,
good government,
the desire for beauty,
and the care for others flourish.
Bless this church
that what we know of your will
may become what we do,
and what we believe
the strong impulse
of our worship and work.
Amen
COMMUNION HYMN All are Welcome CH4 198
Words and music: Marty Haugen
Let us build a house where love can dwell
and all can safely live,
a place where saints and children tell
how hearts learn to forgive;
built of hopes and dreams and visions,
rock of faith and vault of grace;
here the love of Christ shall end divisions:
Chorus
All are welcome, all are welcome,
all are welcome in this place.
Let us build a house where love is found
in water, wine and wheat:
a banquet hall on holy ground,
where peace and justice meet.
Here the love of God, through Jesus,
is revealed in time and space,
as we share in Christ the feast that frees us:
Chorus
All are welcome, all are welcome,
all are welcome in this place.
Let us build a house where hands will reach
beyond the wood and stone
to heal and strengthen, serve and teach
and live the Word they’ve known.
Here the outcast and the stranger
bear the image of God’s face;
let us bring an end to fear and danger:
Chorus
All are welcome, all are welcome,
all are welcome in this place.
INVITATION TO COMMUNION
St Andrew’s is an open community and all are invited to Christ’s table.
Wherever you are on your faith journey, wherever you have come from and wherever you are going to, whatever you believe, whatever you do not believe, you are welcome to participate in the communion. This is God’s meal for all people.
COMMUNION PRAYER
The Creator be with you and all creation.
And also with you.
Open your hearts.
We open them to our Creator.
Let us give thanks to our Creator.
It is right to join creation in thanking the source of life.
It is right to give you thanks, loving Creator.
Your Word is the impulse for all things to be,
for space, stars and stardust to appear,
for Earth to emerge from the deep,
for life to be born of Earth and
for humans to be born of Earth and the Spirit.
You are made known to us as one of us,
becoming a part of Earth,
living, loving, suffering and dying
to redeem humankind, renew creation,
and affirm all born of Earth and the Spirit.
Your presence is the living impulse in all things,
the Christ deep among us,
filling Earth—land, sea and air;
filling every element and place;
filling the grain and the grape
we share with you this day.
Therefore with the energy of life,
ancient voices in the forest,
high voices from the sky,
deep voices from the sea
and the whole company of creation,
we proclaim your presence among us
Holy, holy, holy, God of all life,
earth and sea and sky
are full of your presence
and glorify your name.
And so we recall the ancient story…
We remember the night before he died,
when he shared a meal with his friends,
Jesus took some bread, and set aside some wine,
honouring the God of faithful presence
in the ordinary of life.
He gave thanks for all the blessings in his life.
Broke the bread.
Poured out the wine.
And shared both with his friends.
We break bread as Jesus broke bread,
mindful of the call to love generously and faithfully,
whatever the cost.
We pour out wine
mindful of our responsibility
to be bearers of forgiveness,
creators of justice and understanding.
God of life,
with this bread and this wine,
we celebrate the life of Jesus,
and we offer ourselves
to follow his way.
To this commitment we give our ‘Amen’
and offer it as our gift
to our family, friends and neighbours
and to all the earth.
Come now, tender spirit of God,
brood over these bodily things,
that we and these may be signs of life and love
to each other.
Nourish us in faith.
Bind us together in love.
Fill us with hope.
The gifts of God for the people of God.
Come, for all is made ready.
SHARING THE BREAD AND WINE
Invitation
Come, for all things are now ready.
Come to the table with all your kin
and share with all in need:
the gift of healing for those in pain,
the gift of forgiveness for those who are broken,
the gift of assurance for those in doubt,
and the gift of hope for those in tears.
May we who share these gifts,
share life with one another
and all our kin.
PRAYER AFTER COMMUNION
Let us give thanks for this meal.
We thank you holy energy of life, for the meal we have
celebrated and we pray that we may be healed and become
agents of healing for Earth. Amen.
HYMN Come to our Land AA 26
Words: Shirley Murray Music: Colin Gibson
Come to our land, come to our hearts,
Spirit of peace, Spirit of truth;
bring in the spring, the hope and the green,
Spirit of growth and Spirit of youth.
Chorus
And all our people will sing together:
Wairua Tapu, holy your name,
there’s one great Spirit in all creation,
one great Spirit of God!
Come to our land, come to our hearts,
Spirit of life, breath of new birth;
teach us to care for water and air,
nourish the seed and cherish the earth.
Chorus
Come to our land, come to our hearts
Spirit of bush, Spirit of bird;
speak to the soul of Aotearoa,
joy in your world, and joy in your Word.
Chorus
BLESSING
We go from this place into our week, changed.
A seed of transformation deep within us.
In our conversations and actions thoughts and dreams
may we know more deeply the presence we call God
soothing and disturbing us, a blessing to make us whole.
POSTLUDE To live is to look; Mons. Leidvin Takle
SUNG AMEN
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THANK YOU
Thank you to Judy Dumbleton