May 2, 2021

WELCOME TO ST ANDREW’S ON THE TERRACE

Today’s service is led by The Rev Dr Jim Cunningham
GATHERING

We are called to open ourselves
to the rebirth of hope and joy,
not only in our religious beliefs,
but in our own times of despair
and confusion and loss.

We are called to keep alive
and fan into flames
the sparks of faith and hope,
until real possibilities for new life
emerge from the ashes of yesterday’s dreams.

May our worship help us
to keep alive the hopes for our tomorrows
that will open new possibilities in our lives.

 

PROCESSIONAL HYMN                                                                                                         AA15 ‘Christ is alive!’

Words: © 1993 Shirley Erena Murray

Music: © 1993 Jillian Bray

1. Christ is alive, and the universe must celebrate,

and the stars and the suns shout on this Easter Day!

Christ is alive, and his family must celebrate

in a great alleluia,

a great alleluia

to praise the power that made the stone roll away.

 

2. Here is our hope: in the mystery of suffering

is the heartbeat of Love, Love that will not let go,

here is our hope, that in God we are not separate,

and we sing alleluia,

we sing alleluia

to praise the power that made the stone roll away.

 

3. Christ Spirit, dance through the dullness of humanity

to the music of God, God who has set us free!

You are the pulse of the new creation’s energy;

with a great alleluia

a great alleluia

we praise the power that made the stone roll away.

WELCOME

Kia ora tatou.

Kia ora.

 

 

PRAYER

JESUS’ PRAYER Jim Cotter paraphrase

Eternal Spirit
Life-Giver, Pain-Bearer, Love-Maker,
source of all that is and that shall be,
Father and Mother of us all,
loving God, in whom is heaven:
the hallowing of your name
echo through the universe!
The way of your justice be followed
by the peoples of the world!
Your heavenly will be done
by all created beings!
Your commonwealth of peace and freedom
sustain our hope and come on earth.
With the bread we need for today, feed us.
In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us.
In times of temptation and test,
strengthen us.
From trials too great to endure, spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil, free us.
For you reign in the glory
of the power that is love, now and for ever.
Amen.

LIGHTING THE RAINBOW CANDLE
TIME WITH THE CHILDREN Ellen Murray
BLESSING THE CHILDREN (All stand)
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.
HYMN HIOS 153 ‘Where the light of Easter Day’
Words © 2008 Shirley Erena Murray (Admin. by Hope Publishing Company)
Music © 2008 Jillian Margaret Bray (Admin. by Sylvia Fountain) 5 verses

1. Where the light of Easter Day
shines thro ugh our life, then faith can say,
Christ is living, Christ is moving,
Christ is changing all the world.
Here is God’s good kingdom!

2. Where the yeast of love will rise,
bubbling with God’s new enterprise,
Christ is living, Christ is moving,
Christ is working through the world.
Here is God’s good kingdom!

3. Where a child can grow in trust,
where there is joy that powers are just,
Christ is living, Christ is moving,
Christ will colour all the world.
Here is God’s good kingdom!

4. Where the harvests ripen in peace,
where all sounds of gunfire cease,
Christ is living, Christ is moving,
Christ is healing the world.
Here is God’s good kingdom!

5. Where the Spirit’s flame burns bright,
where there is health and truth and light,
Christ is living, Christ is moving,
Christ will resurrect the world.
Here is God’s good kingdom!

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THE WORD IN TEXTS Lynette Burrell

Gospel Luke 24: 13-35
The Walk to Emmaus

Contemporary reading A Stranger Met By Chance
by Marnie Barrell
A stranger met by chance, a spoken word
that sparks connections, throws a searching light,
makes sense of the confusing and absurd,
invites our hope, turns blindness into sight:
no stranger this, nor chance, but Christ the Lord,
who walks with us on our Emmaus Road.

Companions at the table, faithful friends
who share our dreams and comfort us in pain,
the hospitality that love extends
to those who stumble, try and fall again;
both then and now, discern the Lord’s design,
to be revealed to us through bread and wine.

This sudden joy, this blazing of the heart,
the passion to proclaim the truth we know,
a world to heal, the need to make a start,
the barricades of death to overthrow:
we go, and as we run to raise the shout,
the hidden Christ still smiles, and sends us out.
RESPONSE
For the Word in scripture and poetry,
for the Word among us,
for the Word within us,
we give thanks.
REFLECTION The Road to Emmaus! Jim Cunningham

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OFFERTORY MUSIC
OFFERING HYMN Tune: Duke Street WOV 24
Willing hands, to lead the blind,
heal the wounded, feed the poor.
Love embracing all our kind,
charity with liberal store.

We recognise and bless the gifts brought to the table, and those which wing
their way electronically from our banks to the church’s account.
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 Sandra Kirby
CIRCLE OF PRAYER
We think today of the people of Finland and Orthodox Church of Finland. 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 Hon Kris Faafoi and Hon Julie Anne Genter list MPs. Here in the Central Presbytery, we pray for the leaders and people of St David's Multicultural Parish, Petone.
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

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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.
WELCOME TO THE TABLE

At this Table we give thanks for justice, love, peace and freedom.
At this Table we give thanks for friends and strangers together
in community in this safe place.
For everyone born a place at the Table.
We are all invited.
COMMUNION HYMN FFS 3 ‘As we walk along beside you’
Words: © 2000 Michael Perry The Jubilate Group (Admin. by Hope Publishing Company)
Music: © 2000 Ian Render (Admin. by The New Zealand Hymnbook Trust)

1. As we walk along beside you,
and we hear you speak of mercy,
then it seems our hearts are burning,
for we find you in the sharing of the word.

2. As we ask that you stay with us,
and we watch what you are doing,
then our eyes begin to open,
and we see you in the breaking of the bread.

3. As we reach for you believing,
and we go to love and serve you,
then our lives will be proclaiming
that we know you in your rising from the dead.

4. Alleluia! Alleluia!
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Alleluia! Alleluia!
For we see you in the breaking of the bread.
THE STORY...
We remember the stories from our tradition....
How on many occasions Jesus would share a meal with friends.
Bread and wine, the very basics of life, shared in community.
How bread would be taken, a blessing offered, and then shared amongst them.
And all ate.

How some wine would be poured out, a blessing offered, and then passed amongst them. All of them drank.

When they gathered in this way it was a time of concern,
conversation and celebration.
The bread and the wine symbolised
human lives interconnected
with other human lives,
and the power of giving and receiving.
We remember how he shared a Passover Meal with his followers and gave new meaning to the bread and wine on the table; how he was known to two weary and dispirited travellers in the breaking of bread at Emmaus.

May the passion for life as seen in Jesus
and in the lives and struggles
of many other committed and faithful people then and now,
enable us to dream and to risk....

Together may we re-imagine the world.

Together may we work to make all things new.

Together may we celebrate the possibilities and hope
we each have and are called to share.

For everyone born, a place at the Table.
THE BREAD IS BROKEN
We break the bread for the broken Earth,
ravaged and plundered for greed.

May there be healing for our beautiful blue and green planet.

We break the bread for our broken humanity,
for the powerful and the powerless
trapped by exploitation and oppression.

May there be healing for humanity.

We break the bread for those who follow other paths;
who travel on a different road from us;
those who think and act differently;
those whose belief system is different to ours;
those who see our world through different eyes
of ethnicity and culture.

May there be healing where there is pain and woundedness.

We break this bread for the unhealed hurts and wounds
that lie within us all.

May we, too, be healed.
THE WINE IS POURED
This is the cup of peace and of new life for all.
A sign of love for the community of hope.

A reminder of the call
to live life fully,
to love wastefully,
and to be all that we can be.

Come then, life-giving Spirit of our God,
brood over these bodily things,
and make us one body with Christ;
that we may no longer be in bondage
to the principalities and powers that enslave creation,
but may know your liberating peace
such as the world cannot give.
THE BREAD AND THE WINE ARE SHARED
During this “Covid Time” we celebrate Communion using ONLY
gluten free bread. Wine is served in small glasses – the darker colour
is grape juice – the lighter colour fermented wine.
CALL TO SERVICE
Go now to continue walking the road,
with eyes open to who you meet along the way,
and with hearts ready to welcome the stranger,
and may you feel the steady presence of Jesus’ spirit
guiding and supporting you.

HYMN WOV 450 ‘Now let us from this table rise’
Words: ©1968 Frederik Herman Kaan, Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Music: Robert Jackson Public Domain
1. Now let us from this table rise
renewed in body, mind and soul;
with Christ we die and live again,
his selfless love has made us whole.

2. With minds alert, upheld by grace,
to spread the Word in speech and deed,
we follow in the steps of Christ,
at one with all in hope and need.

3. To fill each human house with love,
it is the sacrament of care;
the work that Christ began to do
we humbly pledge ourselves to share.

4. Then give us courage, Loving God,
to choose again the pilgrim way,
and help us to accept with joy
the challenge of tomorrow’s day.

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BLESSING
SUNG AMEN
POSTLUDE “Te Deum Prelude in D major”
by Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643 –1704)