Easter And Communion
Sermon
Dancing The Sacraments
Sermons And Worship Services For Baptism And Communion
Call To Worship:
Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the bread of life." Come, let us worship that Life together.
Hymn: "Christ The Lord Is Risen Today"
(words: Charles Wesley; music: Lyra Davidica)
Children's Time:
Once upon a time a boy was given a balloon. The boy laughed and played with the balloon from the time he got it until he went to bed. Like most boys, though, he found other things that kept him busy, and the balloon was forgotten. The balloon remembered the fun of being with the boy. So it threw itself out the window to look for the boy. Suddenly the wind dipped the balloon into an open window where a man lay sick in bed. This was the happiest thing that had happened to him in a long time, but a breeze wafted the balloon away again, brushed it across his cheeks in a gentle good--bye, and took it out the window. After a while it flew into the open window of a church in worship. The minister looked annoyed. The congregation didn't know how to look. The children saw the bright balloon and one of them managed to get hold of it and tapped it to a friend. The boy recognized his old friend and laughed out loud, tapping it to his friend. The wind soon took it out of their snatching hands, and the children thought it was the best worship service they had ever attended.
Talk Together:
What do you enjoy most about church? Most about Easter? What does Easter mean to you? (Close with prayer.)
Prayer Of Confession:
Dear Lord, forgive us for being weary with the heaviness of the world. Lift our spirits; fill us with the resurrection of new life. In Christ Jesus we pray. Amen.
Words Of Assurance:
Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die." Wherever Jesus is, there is life.
Hymn: "Alleluia"
(words and music: Jerry Sinclair)
Psalter Reading: Psalm 118:1--2, 14--24
Old Testament: Exodus 33:18
Epistle: 2 Peter 3:13
New Testament: John 20:1--18
Sermon:
Once Calvin and Hobbes found a dying raccoon, and although they brought the raccoon home, kept him warm, and tried to feed him, the raccoon died. That night Calvin couldn't sleep and said to Hobbes, "I can't figure out this death stuff." You know, friends, members of the body of Christ, I can't either. Calvin's mom said that it's part of the life cycle and we don't really understand it. That may make sense, but I don't think we will ever stop trying.
Today is a day of victory over death ... resurrection? Easter is a day to celebrate! To take the world into our arms and see and feel it with amazement, to take nothing for granted, aware of the holy dimension of existence because there is a God over the world!
The rabbi passed through a house of prayer, noticing an old Jew huddled over a book, reading faster and faster, hour after hour, and the rabbi said, "He is so absorbed in his learning, he has forgotten there is a God over the world."
The gift of amazement is experiencing God in the mountain and the stars we see, in the bread we taste daily, in the touch of rain, a soft breeze, or the hand of a loved one, in the sound of singing birds and bubbling brooks and gentle words, in the smell of fresh coffee brewed, and spring resurrected and renewed.
Lewis Thomas said that real amazement is starting out as a single cell that divides into two, then four, then eight, and so on, until there emerges a single cell which will become the human brain. The mere existence of that cell should be one of the great astonishments of the earth. We ought to be walking around all day, calling to each other in endless wonderment of that cell without knowing how it switches on.1
Mystery is not a matter of the mind, a fact revealed through reason, but awe and awareness, an intuition that involves love, seeing with the heart. Mystery encourages us to be modest before radical amazement that says, "Yes!" to life, to resurrection, to God, ourselves, and others. In The Brothers Karamazov Alyosha stood and gazed at the mystery of the stars and then suddenly threw himself down onto the earth, kissing it and weeping, for he longed to forgive everyone, and to be forgiven. He had fallen on the earth a weak boy. He rose up a resolute champion and never, never, all his life long, forgot that moment.
I have never literally kissed the earth, though I have eaten a flower, but when my friends drove from Chicago to Dallas for new employment, upon reaching the Red River, the entrance from Oklahoma to Texas, the husband, wife, and three sons poured out of their car and kissed the earth. It was for them a new beginning, a sense of blessing for what there is for being.
As Christians we believe that God who is with us in the holy feast of communion, the eating of the bread and drinking of the vine, will be with us in that mystery of death.
Jesus knew resurrection was hard to believe. When he raised Lazarus from the dead, he said to his disciples, "Lazarus' death is so that you might believe." He said to Martha, "I am the resurrection. Do you believe this?" He said to God, "Father, I thank you for having heard me. I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me."
Easter is the prayer of the young girl standing barefoot on the beach in Normandy, facing the sea and singing of the many civilizations that had existed there and had passed away. As she sang, she ended each verse with the cry, "O Lord, let something remain!"2
And God looked out on his world and his people, the girl standing barefoot on the beach, the prayers pouring out their pleas, and God said, "I will give you Christ, and that will be enough."
There is an old legend that since the first Easter a large treasure is accumulating of all the hopes, dreams, amazements, love, and gratitude as particles of energy that are never lost. So for 2,000 years we have gathered this day to tell the story of resurrection. That something, resurrection, remains.
Richard Vieth tells how in the midst of disruption, loss, illness, danger, and death, the liturgy was celebrated in the refugee camp in Honduras. First they elaborated on their own suffering: three children a day have died of diarrhea and dehydration this past week; many are sick with parasites, coughs, and headaches. And the catechist asked, "How is Jesus resurrected in us?" An old voice called out, "Only if we carry on with his work of building a better world where justice dwells and suffering is ended." There followed the liturgy of light and in that light for fifteen minutes the valley was filled with voices recalling the names of children, mothers, fathers, priests, nuns.... "But look, the dawn has come!" the catechist shouted. "The stone is rolled away! The tomb cannot hold him!"
As I read the story my son was in Salvador delivering medicine and food supplies for the people in dire need during a dreadful war, and Vieth concluded, "They found their story in the biblical story, and that gave it a significance that no persecution could take away ... I cannot shake the conviction that this disheveled band, with all the foolishness of their hope, are stronger than all the powers arrayed against them. In the weird logic of my imagination, I see them as an incarnation of Jesus' words: 'In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.' "3
When Dante reached the height of heaven, he was moved by "the love that moves the sun and the other stars," a pervading, luring love.
We know that love in Easter and in communion where we know we are not alone. Calvin told Hobbes, "Don't you go anywhere." In the sacrament of communion, we take the bread and wine, saying to one another, "You are my sister; you are my brother. We are one in Christ," knowing that something remains. Come, let us take and celebrate Christ's resurrection this Easter. Amen.
Sacrament Of Holy Communion
Hymn: "O Thou Who This Mysterious Bread"
(words: Charles Wesley; music: American folk melody)
Prayers Of The People
Pastoral Prayer:
Almighty Lord, we confess that we doubt and despair, for death that diminishes life is all around us. We act as if you were absent and listen as though you do not speak. We doubt your promise and your presence. Fashion our fear into faith and open our hearts and eyes and ears to your grace as we pray together:
The Lord's Prayer
Offering
Doxology
Hymn: "Alleluia, Alleluia"
(words and music: Donald Fishel)
Benediction:
Go now in the name of the eternal, loving God through Jesus Christ who is the Resurrection and the Life, and the Holy Spirit through whom we have our beginning and our ending. Amen.
____________
1. Lewis Thomas, The Medusa and the Snail (New York: Bantam Books, 1980).
2. William Butler Yeats, A Vision (New York: Collier, 1996), p. 220.
3. Dick F. Vieth, Holy Power, Human Pain (Chicago, Illinois: Meyer Stone, 1988).
Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the bread of life." Come, let us worship that Life together.
Hymn: "Christ The Lord Is Risen Today"
(words: Charles Wesley; music: Lyra Davidica)
Children's Time:
Once upon a time a boy was given a balloon. The boy laughed and played with the balloon from the time he got it until he went to bed. Like most boys, though, he found other things that kept him busy, and the balloon was forgotten. The balloon remembered the fun of being with the boy. So it threw itself out the window to look for the boy. Suddenly the wind dipped the balloon into an open window where a man lay sick in bed. This was the happiest thing that had happened to him in a long time, but a breeze wafted the balloon away again, brushed it across his cheeks in a gentle good--bye, and took it out the window. After a while it flew into the open window of a church in worship. The minister looked annoyed. The congregation didn't know how to look. The children saw the bright balloon and one of them managed to get hold of it and tapped it to a friend. The boy recognized his old friend and laughed out loud, tapping it to his friend. The wind soon took it out of their snatching hands, and the children thought it was the best worship service they had ever attended.
Talk Together:
What do you enjoy most about church? Most about Easter? What does Easter mean to you? (Close with prayer.)
Prayer Of Confession:
Dear Lord, forgive us for being weary with the heaviness of the world. Lift our spirits; fill us with the resurrection of new life. In Christ Jesus we pray. Amen.
Words Of Assurance:
Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die." Wherever Jesus is, there is life.
Hymn: "Alleluia"
(words and music: Jerry Sinclair)
Psalter Reading: Psalm 118:1--2, 14--24
Old Testament: Exodus 33:18
Epistle: 2 Peter 3:13
New Testament: John 20:1--18
Sermon:
Once Calvin and Hobbes found a dying raccoon, and although they brought the raccoon home, kept him warm, and tried to feed him, the raccoon died. That night Calvin couldn't sleep and said to Hobbes, "I can't figure out this death stuff." You know, friends, members of the body of Christ, I can't either. Calvin's mom said that it's part of the life cycle and we don't really understand it. That may make sense, but I don't think we will ever stop trying.
Today is a day of victory over death ... resurrection? Easter is a day to celebrate! To take the world into our arms and see and feel it with amazement, to take nothing for granted, aware of the holy dimension of existence because there is a God over the world!
The rabbi passed through a house of prayer, noticing an old Jew huddled over a book, reading faster and faster, hour after hour, and the rabbi said, "He is so absorbed in his learning, he has forgotten there is a God over the world."
The gift of amazement is experiencing God in the mountain and the stars we see, in the bread we taste daily, in the touch of rain, a soft breeze, or the hand of a loved one, in the sound of singing birds and bubbling brooks and gentle words, in the smell of fresh coffee brewed, and spring resurrected and renewed.
Lewis Thomas said that real amazement is starting out as a single cell that divides into two, then four, then eight, and so on, until there emerges a single cell which will become the human brain. The mere existence of that cell should be one of the great astonishments of the earth. We ought to be walking around all day, calling to each other in endless wonderment of that cell without knowing how it switches on.1
Mystery is not a matter of the mind, a fact revealed through reason, but awe and awareness, an intuition that involves love, seeing with the heart. Mystery encourages us to be modest before radical amazement that says, "Yes!" to life, to resurrection, to God, ourselves, and others. In The Brothers Karamazov Alyosha stood and gazed at the mystery of the stars and then suddenly threw himself down onto the earth, kissing it and weeping, for he longed to forgive everyone, and to be forgiven. He had fallen on the earth a weak boy. He rose up a resolute champion and never, never, all his life long, forgot that moment.
I have never literally kissed the earth, though I have eaten a flower, but when my friends drove from Chicago to Dallas for new employment, upon reaching the Red River, the entrance from Oklahoma to Texas, the husband, wife, and three sons poured out of their car and kissed the earth. It was for them a new beginning, a sense of blessing for what there is for being.
As Christians we believe that God who is with us in the holy feast of communion, the eating of the bread and drinking of the vine, will be with us in that mystery of death.
Jesus knew resurrection was hard to believe. When he raised Lazarus from the dead, he said to his disciples, "Lazarus' death is so that you might believe." He said to Martha, "I am the resurrection. Do you believe this?" He said to God, "Father, I thank you for having heard me. I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me."
Easter is the prayer of the young girl standing barefoot on the beach in Normandy, facing the sea and singing of the many civilizations that had existed there and had passed away. As she sang, she ended each verse with the cry, "O Lord, let something remain!"2
And God looked out on his world and his people, the girl standing barefoot on the beach, the prayers pouring out their pleas, and God said, "I will give you Christ, and that will be enough."
There is an old legend that since the first Easter a large treasure is accumulating of all the hopes, dreams, amazements, love, and gratitude as particles of energy that are never lost. So for 2,000 years we have gathered this day to tell the story of resurrection. That something, resurrection, remains.
Richard Vieth tells how in the midst of disruption, loss, illness, danger, and death, the liturgy was celebrated in the refugee camp in Honduras. First they elaborated on their own suffering: three children a day have died of diarrhea and dehydration this past week; many are sick with parasites, coughs, and headaches. And the catechist asked, "How is Jesus resurrected in us?" An old voice called out, "Only if we carry on with his work of building a better world where justice dwells and suffering is ended." There followed the liturgy of light and in that light for fifteen minutes the valley was filled with voices recalling the names of children, mothers, fathers, priests, nuns.... "But look, the dawn has come!" the catechist shouted. "The stone is rolled away! The tomb cannot hold him!"
As I read the story my son was in Salvador delivering medicine and food supplies for the people in dire need during a dreadful war, and Vieth concluded, "They found their story in the biblical story, and that gave it a significance that no persecution could take away ... I cannot shake the conviction that this disheveled band, with all the foolishness of their hope, are stronger than all the powers arrayed against them. In the weird logic of my imagination, I see them as an incarnation of Jesus' words: 'In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.' "3
When Dante reached the height of heaven, he was moved by "the love that moves the sun and the other stars," a pervading, luring love.
We know that love in Easter and in communion where we know we are not alone. Calvin told Hobbes, "Don't you go anywhere." In the sacrament of communion, we take the bread and wine, saying to one another, "You are my sister; you are my brother. We are one in Christ," knowing that something remains. Come, let us take and celebrate Christ's resurrection this Easter. Amen.
Sacrament Of Holy Communion
Hymn: "O Thou Who This Mysterious Bread"
(words: Charles Wesley; music: American folk melody)
Prayers Of The People
Pastoral Prayer:
Almighty Lord, we confess that we doubt and despair, for death that diminishes life is all around us. We act as if you were absent and listen as though you do not speak. We doubt your promise and your presence. Fashion our fear into faith and open our hearts and eyes and ears to your grace as we pray together:
The Lord's Prayer
Offering
Doxology
Hymn: "Alleluia, Alleluia"
(words and music: Donald Fishel)
Benediction:
Go now in the name of the eternal, loving God through Jesus Christ who is the Resurrection and the Life, and the Holy Spirit through whom we have our beginning and our ending. Amen.
____________
1. Lewis Thomas, The Medusa and the Snail (New York: Bantam Books, 1980).
2. William Butler Yeats, A Vision (New York: Collier, 1996), p. 220.
3. Dick F. Vieth, Holy Power, Human Pain (Chicago, Illinois: Meyer Stone, 1988).
