September 27, 2020

WELCOME TO ST ANDREW’S ON THE TERRACE

We invite you to take a beach stone from the baskets at the entrance and hold it in the palm of your hand during the service while we contemplate the beauty, bounty and fragility of the land on which we live.

KARANGA – GATHERING CALL

Haere mai! Haere mai! Haere mai!

We come to share the traditions of the Christian community:

to sing, to pray, to listen, to ponder.

Today we come together especially

to stand in awe at the beauty of this planet

and its blessings.

 

As we stand on the land

here in Te Whanganui-ā-Tara

we contemplate its fragility,

celebrate its riches and ponder its future.

We hold in our hands beach stones from our harbour

as we consider the part we play in plundering the land

and imagine how we might help its healing.

 

We acknowledge that land

is part of a sacred circle of life.

It provides us with garden for food,

a base for shelter, a place to belong.

 

We gather here today

to contemplate that

land is part of our web of life,

that life is a holy thing

linking the land, each creature

and blessing us,

making connections between the earth and us all.      Amen

 

HĪMENE – HYMN AA 54 ‘God of the galaxies’
Words: © Shirley Erena Murray 1992
Music: Douglas Mews ©1992 Hope Publishing Co.

1. God of the galaxies spinning in space,
God of the smallest seed, our living source,
yours is the gift of this beautiful place.
Let us care for your garden
and honour the earth.

2. Careless and covetous, gross are our greeds,
taking the riches, the garden provides,
wasting its goodness, forgetting its needs.
Let us care for your garden
and honour the earth.

3. Forests and rivers are ravaged and die,
raped is the land till it bleeds in its clay,
silenced the birdsong and plundered the sea.
Let us care for your garden
and honour the earth.

4. Let there be beauty, and let there be air
fragrant with peace, never poisoned with fear,
freed from the plagues of pollution and war.
Let us care for your garden
and honour the earth.

5. Life is a holy thing, life is a whole,
linking each creature and blessing us all,
making connections of body and soul.
Let us care for your garden
and honour the earth.
MIHI WHAKATAU – WELCOME
Kia ora tatou.
Kia ora.
Duet sung by Joseph Letoa and Judah Jackson: “The Prayer”
David Foster (composer), Carole Bayer Sager (lyrics), Alberto Testa, and Tony Renis (arrangers).

KARAKIA – PRAYER
We are blessed with our land in Aotearoa,
but along with the whole of planet earth
our land is crying out for help.
Families starve
countries burn
floods ravage
arctic regions melt
crucial waters evaporate in rising heat
pandemics happen out of the imbalance –
the devastation that deprives animals of their natural habitats
and brings them in closer contact with us.

Let us celebrate the web of life:
Let us care for the land and honour it
and custodians past and present who have cared for it
tangata whenua, environmentalists, ecologists,
lovers of the land.
Let our hearts and consciences be stirred;
let the calling of the land for justice
move us to be like the prophets of old.
Let us not just speak boldly on behalf of the land
and voice opposition to its desecration,
let us find ways to act
and let us do so out of love
and the longing to leave our area, our country, our planet
healthy when the time comes for us to depart.
Amen
E TO MATOU MATUA I TE RANGI – 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.
TE KĀNARA O TE WHARE ĀNIWANIWA – LIGHTING THE RAINBOW CANDLE
Solo by Ursula Scott “Will there really be a morning?”
Composer Ricky Ian Gordon, words Emily Dickinson.
TE RANGIMĀRIE – 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.
KŌRERO TARA O TE PAIPERA TAPU – THE WORD IN TEXTS Maxine Cunningham
Rongopai – Gospel Matthew 21:23-32
Contemporary readings
From “Where to Next? Decolonisation and the Stories in the Land” by Moana Jackson in Imagining Decolonisation, edited by Bianca Elkington and Jennie Smeaton,
Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 2020, pages 150-153.

From Chapter 16, “Potiki” by Patricia Grace
“So we tried to turn our backs on the hills and not look up. The hills did not belong to us any more. At the same time we could not help but remember that land does not belong to people, but that people belong to the land. We could not forget that it was land who, in the very beginning held the secret, who contained our very beginnings within herself. It was land that held the seed and who kept the root hidden for a time when it would be needed. We turned our eyes away from what was happening to the hills and looked to the soil and the sea.”
WHAKAUTU – RESPONSE
For the Word in scripture,
for the Word among us,
for the Word within us,
we give thanks.
KŌRERO PŪMAHARA – REFLECTION
‘Mingling the hau: a story of loving the land’ Rev. Dr Niki Francis
HĪMENE – HYMN ‘He Waiata mō Aotearoa’ (Song for Aotearoa)
Words: © Bronwyn Angela White
Music: Hanover (O Worship the King) WOV 67
1. Give thanks for Creation: orokohanga
that cosmic explosion—our whakapapa;
for logos and mythos, for spirit and word
give thanks for the ethos through which they are heard.

2. Remember ngā tūpuna—those gone before
their stars shining on us in Aotearoa
for we are the ashes of stars as they die
niho taniwha on the cloak of the sky.

3. Give thanks for the speakers: ngā kaikōrero
we listen and hear—aroā whakarongo.
With courage, with passion we greet the new day
ngā pā harakeke of cosmos and clay.
KOHA – OFFERING

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.
As the offering is taken up, the St Andrew’s Singers will perform “Look at the world”.

St Andrews Singers: “Look at the World” Words and music by John Rutter.
KAWANGA – OFFERING PRAYER (said together)
These gifts express our offering of ourselves,
our energies, our hopes to respond to the earth’s pain,
the urgent call for us to work together
to heal and renew the Earth.
Amen

PANUI: TE WAIRUA KE TE WHANAU

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.
INOI O NGA TANGATA – PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE Catriona Cairns
KARAKIA POROTAKA – CIRCLE OF PRAYER
We think today of the people of Bulgaria and the Orthodox Churches throughout the world. We remember the detainees of Manus and Nauru Islands, yearning that their cases be resolved. In New Zealand, we remember those who work this election season; candidates, members of political parties and voters. Here in the Central Presbytery, we pray for the leaders and people of Johnsonville Uniting Church.
KARAKIA O ST ANARU – 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
HĪMENE – HYMN AA 155 ‘Where Mountains Rise’
Words © 1971, Shirley Erena Murray
Music by Vernon Griffiths © 1971 Faber Music Ltd
1. Where mountains rise to open skies
your name, O God, is echoed far,
from island beach to kauri’s reach,
in water’s light, in lake and star.

2. Your people’s heart, your people’s part
be in our caring for this land,
for faith to flower, for aroha*
to let each other’s mana** stand.

3. From broken word, from conflict stirred,
from lack of vision, set us free
to see the line of your design,
to feel creation’s energy.

4. Your love be known, compassion shown,
that every child have equal scope:
in justice done, in trust begun
shall be our heritage and hope.

5. Where mountains rise to open skies
your way of peace distil the air,
your spirit bind all humankind,
one covenant of life to share!
* aroha = Māori for “all-embracing love”
** mana = Māori for “dignity, prestige”
POROPOROAKIA MĀNAWATANGA – FAREWELL & BLESSING
As we leave this place to go into a new week,
let us nurture determination
to love the earth back to health
for future generations and ourselves.
Let us mingle the hau
of tangata whenua and tauiwi
in a combined effort to heal us and the land.

Let love be our motivation
Let love be our karakia
Let love be our tikanga
Let love be the miracle.
Archbishop Don Tamihere, Te Pīhopa o Aotearoa (adapted)
WAIATAHIA AMENE – SUNG AMEN